


Beyond the Radio Horizon

by AndaAculous



Series: Canny Dreadful [1]
Category: What We Do in the Shadows (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood and Injury, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Porn with Feelings, Under-negotiated Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:40:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 28,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25808992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndaAculous/pseuds/AndaAculous
Summary: “My name is Guillermo de la Cruz,” Guillermo said, and Nandor’s brain broke.It occurred to Nandor then that life, afterlife, whatever this was--was supremely unfair.His familiar, who was in no way strong, vicious, powerful, or cool, had just broken the meter in all of the above. It was like that game at the fair, with the hammer and the bell at the very top? Soft, weak, unimposing Guillermo, who he had once called the last donut in the case, had nearly made Nandor the Relentless pant and sputter.Damn him.
Relationships: Guillermo de la Cruz/Nandor the Relentless
Series: Canny Dreadful [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1867123
Comments: 11
Kudos: 114





	1. The Heart Wants

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bear with me while I shuffle these stories in exactly the wrong way to get things to fit together how they should lol. What is life.

As he watched Guillermo slice through the vampires in the theater, any number of emotions flitted through Nandor’s head. 

Just as quickly as his familiar moved--no, his former familiar, he reminded himself with a pang, then felt anger at Guillermo for the pang--he felt a myriad of other emotions; surprise, fear, relief, and then a swell of affection and awe. He dry heaved, and then gasped at Guillermo’s skillful slash with the wooden stake across the chest of an attacking vampire.

His mind, unbidden, reminded him of sweet, soft Guillermo, swinging down from the rafters on a rope, like some he-man from an old film he couldn’t quite remember.

Nandor swallowed past the feeling he refused to name, fighting against his own rising arousal. It would be easier if Guillermo weren’t still actively fighting, his soft and normally kind face pulled back into a fierce snarl.

Nandor snuck a peek to his companions, who were awestruck as well. Laszlo showed confusion, as though the situation was still not making sense, and Nandor sympathized. Nadja was clearly shocked and a little disgusted. Colin’s eyes were blue, but absent of the normal murderous glee, following the action with grimaces and a grudging respect.

All of this took place within a mere moment, because a second later, his friends gasped, and his heart plummeted to his feet. Had Guillermo finally fallen, his luck up until that point turned against him? Nandor felt his heart clench, but when he turned back to the action, Guillermo had pulled out his cross, and thrown it into the chest of an attacker. The vampire fell back several feet, and squirmed on the ground in pain. Sizzling skin smoked up from behind the seats.

Nandor swallowed a lump. He was unsure if he was going to cry, laugh, or moan at the battle prowess that his cute and harmless--he thought--Guillermo was showing. It was like looking at a different person. How could Nandor have been so fooled? Guillermo was making a fool of him.

Damn him. Damn Guillermo for making him feel all of these things! He nearly gagged at the thought of the emotion he dared not name even to himself, as he squirmed in his seat and strained against the rope, hissing. He was excited. It was hot. Damn it all. 

Curse Guillermo. He was stewing over all of this, and then before he was aware of himself, he warned Guillermo of a vampire approaching from behind. Guillermo dispatched them just as quickly, and Nandor’s pride rose above the other emotions jockeying within him for dominance.

But that wasn’t right either, was it? He felt pride for his familiar committing the number one crime a vampire could commit?

Nandor was old. It had been a long time since he had felt true fear for his own life, or for the lives of anyone else for that matter.

The twirling spray of holy water from both hands was a turning point for Nandor. Internally, he remembered Guillermo throwing holy water on him when he was on fire at his dear granddaughter’s funeral.

Guillermo could do this to him. He was doing it to all of the other vampires here. Yes, those vampires had wanted to kill Nandor and his housemates, and that was definitely putting more weight on the “Hot” side of the scale. He had never been rescued before. 

Definitely not in such a dramatic and public way. It was humiliating, yes, but that only stoked the flame inside him.

The fighting was winding down finally, and Nandor surveyed the carnage his Guillermo had wrought.

His Guillermo stood, panting and luscious, victorious and powerful, covered in blood, in the midst of his carnage.

Nandor had never been so turned on in his life.

He had just been imagining Guillermo striding up the stairs, pulling the silver rope tighter. Taking out a dagger and forcibly taking Nandor’s blood from him. Taking whatever he wanted from Nandor, with Nandor helpless to stop him.

His mind had been just on the verge of Guillermo’s lips meeting his, when he felt rather than heard his own voice, saying something like, “Is there something you want to tell us, Guillermo?”

Boom. Nailed it, He thought to himself. He was most definitely not calm, but damn, he sure sounded like he was.

“My name is Guillermo de la Cruz,” Guillermo said, and Nandor’s brain broke.

It occurred to Nandor then that life, afterlife, whatever this was--was supremely unfair.

His familiar, who was in no way strong, vicious, powerful, or cool, had just broken the meter in all of the above. It was like that game at the fair, with the hammer and the bell at the very top? Soft, weak, unimposing Guillermo, who he had once called the last donut in the case, had nearly made Nandor the Relentless pant and sputter.

Damn him.

He was a vampire! His familiar, former or not, just showed him and everyone who mattered (Not Colin Robinson, though) that Nandor was weak. He was not in control. He could be defeated. He could even be killed.

And he was not as in control of himself as he had originally believed.

It Was Unfair.

“That’s all that you have to say!” He demanded.

He saw the next thing come out of his mouth as though he was having an out of body experience.

Like he was hovering over all of it and it was all happening in slow motion. He was powerless to stop it.

“We had to get our own laundry!” He shouted, and immediately winced.

But maybe it would work? He was grasping at straws, he knew, but any gambit was better than no gambit. Maybe, any second now, Guillermo would turn sheepish, apologize to his master, and they could go home like any other night. Guillermo would brush his hair, hang up his cloak, and hold his hand as he went to bed. Like any night, before things began to change.

Because, he reasoned with the Universe, this couldn’t possibly be real. Something was fundamentally wrong here. If this one thing was so very wrong, and it was real despite its wrongness, he would have to go back and sift through his entire image of himself, his entire life, and figure out what the hell had happened to culminate in this one, disastrous moment.

And so, to that end, if he pretended hard enough, he could pretend that nothing had to change. They could go back to everything the way it was, and he wouldn’t have to feel all of these messy things ever again.

Things would return to normal.

Although, he conceded, he could probably get away with pawing Guillermo a little more often, while he lifted him to clean the chandelier… The muscle and reflexes under the beautiful cushion of pudge, he could devote some time to savor the feel of it under his hands.

Surely Guillermo would not notice. If he did, he could always hypnotize him to forget. In a completely aloof manner, of course. Aloofness was key; it wouldn’t do to let Guillermo know.

He could take care of that later, alone, when Nandor could feel his dirty shame in secret.

Guillermo stood for a beat, a familiar quirk to his eyebrow. Confusion, disbelief, and something Nandor could barely acknowledge.

Guillermo’s face twisted, briefly, into anger. The stake in his hand splintered and broke into half and clattered to the ground loudly.

He could vaguely hear his housemates yelling at him, but all he could see was the awed confusion on Guillermo’s face as he stared down at his own hand, then flexed it back into a fist.

Well. He guessed that pretending really hard wasn’t going to work this time. Shit.

Guillermo approached the stage wordlessly and began untying them all. He heard the rope being thrown off to the floor beneath the stage.

Then Guillermo made to leave, without a single word.

Nandor’s heart clenched, but he couldn’t bring himself to say anything. He reached uselessly, and then dropped his hand, thinking better of it, before he realized the others were watching him.

Laszlo and Nadja shared a decided look.

“Giz-ierrmo,” Laszlo began, trilling the R with a fancy hand gesture, “Surely we can think of something--”

“Laszlo, shut up!” Nadja hissed, “Guillermo,” she said pointedly, glaring at her husband, “You are definitely leaving, then? There must be some way we can convince you to stay…” She floundered for words, looking around her desperately.

Unfortunately for her, this was all brand new territory for all of them, and they were all at a loss for words.

Her hands were clasped in front of her, pleading. “What are we supposed to do now?”

There was an expression on Guillermo’s face that Nandor had never seen. He was above this. What did these things matter to him?

Sometime between Guillermo swinging in like the best thing in the world and his worst nightmare all rolled into one ugly sweater, he had decided to roll with this. He hadn’t survived this long without learning that sometimes, if he didn’t want to break, he would have to bend a little.

That certainly didn’t mean he had to make it easy on anyone.

But before he could think of anything to say, as usual, Laszlo wedged himself into the awkward silence with surprising abandon.

“I do have some experience with the art of disguise, my dear, so perhaps we could…” He said, and Colin elbowed him in the ribs.

“Uh, if I could offer my, um, two cents, if you will…” Colin Robinson began, and everyone heaved a quick, fortifying sigh.

Nandor took a moment to look at Guillermo’s face, surreptitiously, he thought, but Guillermo looked at him out of the corners of his eyes as Colin spoke.

Nandor’s traitorous face flushed, and his gaze whipped away, as though Guillermo was a cross, burning his eyeballs. It nearly felt that way, but the pain was duller, and centralized somewhere in his chest.

“If I could offer… Guillermo, how do you feel about the word mercenary, there? No, maybe that’s not the right word.”

Nandor looked at Colin, mouth agape.

Colin was floundering for the right word, then before anyone could stop him, giving a brief etymological history of the word “mercenary.”

“Colin Robinson,” Nandor hissed warningly, as everyone swayed perilously on their feet.

“Oh,” Colin appeared to catch himself. He glanced briefly from face to face. They were all sapped and showing it, and none of them more than Guillermo, whose eyelids fluttered, and shook himself to clear his head. “Sorry, long night. Nandor, go ahead and pick up Guillermo before he falls, and we’ll get out of here. I’ll drive.”

He headed towards the door with his hands in his pockets, whistling.

Nadja and Laszlo dragged their heels behind him with as much dignity as they could muster.

Nadja looked back briefly, tired, but sharp-eyed as ever when it came to things like this. Laszlo kept walking, waving ambiguously behind him for Nadja to hurry it up.

“Well, catch him before he falls,” she gestured, annoyed.

Nandor looked over at Guillermo, and just in time, caught his former-familiar before he could fall to the ground. He awkwardly tried not to give into his instinct to cradle his head and gently swept him off his feet, so as not to wake him.

As embarrassed as Nandor was about his new revelation concerning his familiar, he was feeling less and less angry about it by the second.

The discomfort level was certainly high, but perhaps that had more to do with Nadja eyeing him with something like faintly disgusted realization while he wrestled to come to terms with it himself.

“Don’t fuck it up,” Nadja mumbled, and Nandor jumped.

“Fucking hell,” Nandor mumbled back. “Fuck what up? What is even fuck uppable that you could possibly be talking about?” He stammered, and moved to follow her out the door. He wanted to be alone with Guillermo, but perhaps not in this particular… setting.

A curtain rod from somewhere just offstage fell to the ground with surprising clatter. The two vampires watched it happen dispassionately.

“I don’t know, you just pouted at him about the laundry after he saved your life, so…” She shrugged. “Perspective might be nice, yes?”

Nandor sighed heavily. He didn’t want to admit it, but he knew she was right. Rather than say so out loud, however, he instead elected to stare down at the peacefully sleeping face of the man who had changed everything.

Without his permission, of course. The jerk. But he had done it regardless.

“It doesn’t have to be a bad thing, you know, Nandor,” she said quietly, after the echoes of the fallen curtain had gone, “To give in a little.” She sighed.

Nandor nodded before he could stop himself, and froze at her next words.

“It’s not so bad sometimes. To relent.” Then she resumed stumbling after her husband and Colin. “Also, you should hurry. Who knows what else all of this will bring down upon our heads?”

Nandor nodded, again, although she couldn’t see him do it. He had no problem acknowledging her wisdom, if not her overall correctness. Nadja was usually right when it came to these things. That didn’t mean he had to let her know it. There was enough room for only so much smug in their group, and Nandor claimed the rights most of it.

Nandor wordlessly lifted Guillermo, bridal style, too tired to care once again who saw. It was only Nadja, after all, and she apparently already knew. She was also the one least likely to judge him for it. Nandor was too tired from Colin’s draining to care how weak he looked. And Guillermo was too asleep to see how weak Nandor was over him.

When he awoke, Guillermo would never be the wiser, Nandor assured himself.

Guillermo shot awake, from the worst nightmare of his life.

He had been staking vampires, left and right, feeling pretty good about it too, he might add.

But when they finally stopped coming, he looked at his fallen foes and saw the dead faces of Nandor, Nadja, and Laszlo.

He was standing over their dead bodies, center stage of the vampire theater, fighting back the urge to vomit.

The audience began cheering, but they were all Colin, a hundred Colins all clapping and whooping. Then suddenly, the axe swung down and chopped off his head.

That’s when he woke up with a start.

He was in the Blue Room in the first floor hallway. Even without his glasses, he would know that wallpaper anywhere, blurry or not. The bedcovers had been pulled over him with care.

He reached for the lamp by the bed, and saw his glasses placed carefully within his immediate reach.

His mother must be worried out of her mind.

His phone was nowhere to be found. He rolled his eyes. They were dumb enough to bring him back to the house after what they had seen him do, but smart enough to take his phone? Colin Robinson was clearly calling some shots.

He froze as he heard footsteps outside of his door, someone attempting to be quiet, but forgetting that human ears could still hear pretty well, despite hearing less than vampires.

He played a game of silent chicken with whoever it was, the longer the wait, the more he was convinced.

“Nandor?” Guillermo said, annoyed.

Nandor fled.

Seconds later, with his ear to the door, he could hear Nandor and Nadja arguing several rooms away.

“You’re such a coward,” he heard Nadja say, but with less venom than he would have expected, all things considered.

He vaguely heard Nandor haughtily deny this accusation, and the conversation went on, too quiet for him to hear, but that didn’t stop him from straining. Sounded like a battle story. It would make sense, given the topic of conversation and Nandor’s fragile ego, but more had suddenly changed than he could make peace with. Who could say what they were really discussing?

Perhaps they were debating whether or not to kill Guillermo for his crimes?

He held his breath in the hopes of hearing more.

“Hello!” Colin shouted and pounded on the door cheerfully.

Guillermo swore under his breath and clasped his thumping heart. Whatever conversation had been happening between the others before was now outside of his reach, thanks to Colin Fucking Robinson.

He looked around suddenly, and saw in the corner two of the crew blearily starting up their equipment. Apparently they had been asleep on the floor until Colin’s rude knock. He supposed it was good to know that at least the household’s disregard for most human comfort hadn’t apparently changed all that much, despite his own surprising circumstances upon waking up.

“Hey dude,” Colin began, laughing. “Thought you might like to know, I put your phone in Nandor’s coffin. So you know… Don’t leave without it.” Colin chuckled and Guillermo could feel his energy being drained through the sudden sheer rage that choked him.

Nandor was the last person he wanted to see.

Stupid Colin. He knew too much. Guillermo’s hand clenched over the wooden stake. Maybe Colin Robinson had been the one to lovingly tuck him in. The thought made Guillermo’s stomach turn.

“I’m going out to get something. I’ll be back before sunrise. You kids have fun!”

Colin’s footsteps retreated down the hall.

The camera was very close to his face. Despite his annoyance at this, his brain was working through too many possible scenarios to fully care. He wasn’t even sure what emotion was being captured, because he couldn’t make out what he was actually feeling.

“Guillermo,” the camera operator prompted. “Can you tell us what’s happening now?”

He spared one sideways glare for the crew, intruding on a moment he would have preferred they didn’t see. He was as confused as them, but at least he had nearly a decade longer with the inhabitants of the house, so made an educated guess.

“I think they fucking kidnapped me,” he gritted out.

“Why would they do that?” the sound recordist asked.

“I don’t know. To stall? Figure out whether to kill me or not?” His face was grim.

“Assholes,” he continued, spitting curses in Spanish. “Colin Robinson knocked me out and then they brought me back here. After I saved their lives they…”

He stopped. His clothes were clean.

A white button-down shirt and a pair of fresh khakis. He had definitely not been wearing this when he had been knocked out.

His trenchcoat was nowhere in sight, but a single wooden stake had been left next to him while he slept.

He stared at it, unseeingly, in his hand.

“What are you thinking, Guillermo?” The crew prompted again.

Despite himself, stuttered out, “Are they trying to… Make peace with me?” He reached up suddenly to feel his neck, first one side and then the other, and found it unblemished.

He was confused.

He reached into his mouth and felt his still very human canine teeth.

He rubbed a weary hand over his face, shakily.

He wanted to say that he was disappointed, but that would only explain half of it. Of course, it had been something that he had wanted for years, but now? Everything had changed. He was at once relieved, disappointed, and… hopeful?

He looked again at the stake in his hand, considering.

After a long moment and some very deep breaths, he appeared to come to a decision. He shoved open the door and strode down the hall towards the fancy room, leaving the two crew members to scramble after him.

“Guillermo, wait--” The camera operator gasped.

Guillermo stopped in the main hall, noting absently that it was the same spot in which the Baron had met his end. That wasn’t his reason for standing there, though.

The two crewmembers nearly ran into him as they caught up, but he silenced them with a gesture.

He listened.

He heard on the floor above Nadja and Laszlo’s hurried footsteps. He could hear Nadja telling Laszlo what to pack. A brief glance at his watch showed a mere two hours until sunrise. Not much time.

The basement door was shut tightly. Colin had likely left, as he had said.

Finally, he scanned what he could see, searching for any apparent threats.

Satisfied that the house was secure, he made his way to Nandor’s room.

Under Nandor’s door, Guillermo could see the shadows of two feet walking back and forth across the room. Things were being thrown around haphazardly. Guillermo realized Nandor was also packing, and tried not to wince. He remembered once coming home to find Nandor had packed an overnight bag for himself to spend the night at a lady vampire friend’s house. It was like the packed bag of a toddler, and the bedroom had been even worse. Clothes strewn everywhere with no regard to how to put them back, knickknacks knocked over under the weight of velvet and silk.

It had taken Guillermo nearly three hours to sort back out, and had discovered that Nandor had broken one of his prized horse figurines in his haste. Nandor had blamed Guillermo for that vociferously for weeks afterwards, although Guillermo suspected he was only bitter because he hadn’t actually gotten any that night, or any other night, from that particular lady vampire.

In the hallway, remembering this, Guillermo fought back an affectionate smile, felt the corner of his mouth twitch upwards before ramming back down into a hard line. The camera next to him shifted to get a closer look at his expression, and a floorboard creaked.

The shadows of feet under the door froze, and shifted weight several times, almost as if Nandor was nervous.

“Guillermo?” Nandor called out, wavering, although he would never admit it.

“Yes Mas-” Guillermo closed his eyes briefly, cleared his throat, and continued “Nandor.”

“Why are you sneaking out there?”

Guillermo snorted. Who was being sneaky, here?

“I’m not sneaking, Nandor. I woke up here after you all kidnapped me,” He said, ready for a fight, and he could feel the crew members shudder and take a small step back.

Nandor flung open the door with the air of an aggressive turkey, and for the briefest moment there was a look of desperate vulnerability that Guillermo remembers hoarding in his earliest memories as a familiar in this house, and then it is gone.

“Kidnapped you? That’s a bit dramatic. I suppose considering your dramatic entrance at the theater, I shouldn’t be surprised. Yes, we brought you here, but only because you fainted,” he said pointedly, and Guillermo felt his hackles rise. “I caught you before you could hurt yourself on the floor with your weak human body, and now you are here and safe with us.” Nandor preens slightly for the camera, whose operator is definitely running on the empty fumes of the last Red Bull and struggling with even that.

Nandor was expectantly waiting for Guillermo’s thanks, and Guillermo considers that maybe it’s time for the documentary crew to go. There are a lot of reasons for this, but the main one is so that there is no evidence of Guillermo strangling Nandor to death with his own cravat.

Guillermo looked at the sound recordist and back at the camera operator warningly.

“Get out of here,” Guillermo muttered.

Thankfully, they leave with little to no protest.

When they are finally alone, Guillermo and Nandor are left standing there, staring at one another, sizing each other up in a way that they never had before.

They are no longer Master and Servant. The boundary that had kept Guillermo subservient to Nandor, namely the power of life and death and the bargain for eternal life, was gone. Too many things had changed for it to have retained any of its validity or power over them.

Guillermo could track the exact moment that this also occurs to Nandor. The discomfort and pain on his face was interesting to behold, considering how often Guillermo had felt that in his presence in the past.

He couldn’t find it within him to sympathize, not even a little, as Guillermo had had a lot of uncomfortable revelations in the past weeks.

Nandor was certainly overdue for some, the complacent, imperious, self-absorbed bastard.

“You and I both know that Colin Robinson knocked me out and this looks a lot like kidnapping,” Guillermo began. He would not even slightly tolerate Nandor’s attempt to gaslight him. Not again. “Why would you even bring me back here? After what you had just seen me do? Nandor, you can’t be that stupid!”

Nandor puffed out his chest, “Stupid!” he repeated, affronted, and about to say more on the topic, but Guillermo cut him off.

“Yes, Nandor! How do you know I won’t kill you?”

Nandor stood ramrod straight, and walked slowly to Guillermo, until they were mere breaths apart. He glanced down at the stake gripped in the man’s hand and then back up, challengingly.

Guillermo could see the waver of fear in Nandor’s eyes, but knew that Nandor would never admit it, even if it meant his certain death.

It was one of the things he had always admired most about Nandor.

Right now, though, it made Guillermo see red.

“Do it, then. Vampire killer.” Nandor hissed slightly, baring his fangs threateningly.

Guillermo seemed to lose track of himself briefly, remembering the last time Nandor had said that to him, jokingly, after he had staked Carol in the main hallway. Damn. The main hallway had seen a lot of death at his hands.

Coming out of a stupor, he felt the heft of the stake in his hand. Felt the grain of the wood against the inside of his palm. Instinctually, and outside of his own control, he had brought it to Nandor’s chest, and pressed in a dire warning.

The two stared at one another, and Guillermo’s breath was the only sound, panting and harsh.

Nandor’s imperious expression faltered, unsure. Fear was winning out, it was plain to see.

Guillermo’s hand fell, finally, the stake limp in his grasp, and he watched Nandor sag with relief. He turned away to compose himself, running a hand through his blood-spattered hair.

“Don’t think this means I wouldn’t,” Guillermo threatened.

Nandor rolled his eyes, challenging. “Make up your mind, Guillermo,” he hissed, hands forming claws.

Suddenly, Guillermo whipped back towards Nandor, confused, stake forgotten as he gesticulated with it. “Did you change my clothes? Who changed my clothes?” He whisper-yelled.

This had to be the most bizarre night Guillermo had ever witnessed, and in eleven years in a vampire house, there had been a few.

Nandor cleared his throat, crossed his arms in front of his chest and hummed, appearing to think about it. To really give it a good think.

“Colin Robinson?” He asked, more than said, and shrugged, refusing to meet Guillermo’s eyes.

He wasn’t proud of it, but he had gotten the clothes in record speed, and then he had enjoyed himself immensely, voyeuristically, despite not groping his familiar nearly as much as he had wanted to. A victimless crime!

Guillermo seemed to guess despite this and narrowed his eyes.

“Nandor, why am I here?”

“You don’t want to be here?” Nandor’s brow furrowed. He hadn’t fully considered that, or at least not since they had left the theater. Perhaps he hadn’t wanted to think about the possibility. The last time Guillermo had left was already too hard to think about.

Sure, Guillermo could hit him, yell at him, punish him for all of the things he had done, or hadn’t done, things he might have said maybe, over the years, but it had never occurred to Nandor that Guillermo wouldn’t want to be there.

Guillermo had saved him, after all. Surely he had saved him because his familiar regretted leaving.

Guillermo shrugged with hysterical energy.

“Then why did you save me?” Nandor asked, pitifully confused.

Guillermo roared and in frustration and backed Nandor up against his coffin, and he stumbled backwards to sit down hard on the step stool. There was a wooden stake pointed at his heart for the second time tonight. He tried to remind his exhausted body that it was serious, dammit, not sexy. He huffed out a shocked, dizzy breath despite himself.

He bared his fangs and hissed warningly while Guillermo lit into him and he tried desperately not to get too hard from it.

“I saved you because for eleven years we had an agreement! Dammit, Nandor, do you know how many times I almost left because you backed out again? And again, and again, and again, and again--”

Nandor’s hands instinctively moved to stroke Guillermo’s face, to calm him, but Guillermo saw this as a possible attack and the stake dug in harder.

Nandor himself would be the first to admit that his “Head-Ripping” and “Affectionate Caress” gestures were nearly indistinguishable until the move was completed.

He had to give that one to Guillermo.

Nandor thanked his lucky stars he had yet to give himself away anyway, despite how much it felt like the reality of it was continuously slapping him in the face by the second.

Nandor was sure he would see the moment when Guillermo would put the pieces together. Not yet, but sometime in the near future. He would keep trying to delay that as long as he could, but the man wasn’t making it very easy.

“Guillermo,” Nandor gasped, putting his hands behind his back to show Guillermo he meant no harm. He bit down on his lip, hard, to keep himself under control.

Curse Guillermo, Nandor thought. It had been years since Nandor had gotten any, and centuries since anyone could do this to him, and he struggled not to let himself fall to the same level as his perverted housemates.

Guillermo wasn’t even aware of what he was doing to his master, it was wrong to feel this way. But Nandor could only do so much to quell it.

He would have to end this conversation soon, or it would all be over sooner than he could bear.

Guillermo looked down at him with an odd expression that Nandor couldn’t place, and backed away.

“My promise still stands, if you still want it,” He whispered, catching his breath that he didn’t actually need. “But I can’t do it yet. You’re not ready.”

Guillermo shot him a glare.

“Alright, alright! Fucking guy.” He averted his eyes shamefully. “I’m not ready.”

“So then give me a reason to stay,” Guillermo pleaded. The stake still hung limply from his hand, and Nandor followed its movement warily.

Guillermo rolled his eyes and shoved it into the back of his waistband.

Nandor let himself relax a bit more.

“You don’t want to be here anymore if I can’t turn you right now? I understand. I won’t keep you where you don’t wish to be,” Nandor he said haughtily, shoulders sagging. Perhaps that was better, anyway. Nandor liked how Guillermo made him feel, but nothing would ever come of it, right? On some level, he had felt very sure of that, but he had certainly been looking forward to some serious gropes. Surreptitious gropes, of course. Guillermo would never have been the wiser.

But now the thought makes him sadder than he thought it would. Lonelier. In any case, and he did mean in any case, Nandor would have preferred it if Guillermo was with him willingly. Otherwise, what was the point?

“What the fuck makes you think this isn’t where I want to be?” Guillermo snapped.

Nandor paused, shocked, but couldn’t turn back to face Guillermo. It would give too much away. This had to be done the right way, or no way at all. Despite Guillermo’s many recent accusations that Nandor was heartless, thoughtless, and crass, he felt this deep in his bones.

He resumed packing, trying to distract himself from the constricting feeling in his chest.

“You left a note, didn’t you?” Nandor waved his hand dismissively while holding a silken undergarment. even though it had torn him up inside, and still did. How dare Guillermo make him feel this way? Maybe he could suffer a little, too.

“Nandor,” Guillermo began, with the air of a long-suffering soul.

“Well, go on, then,” Nandor said. “You left. So be gone if you want to be gone!” He knew that the words coming out of his mouth were diametrically opposed to what he actually wanted, but he couldn’t help but feel a little bit more like himself as he said them.

Nandor turned back to his suitcase, however, wishing his voice hadn’t quivered so pitifully towards the end there. He held still, hoping Guillermo would leave him to his grief already, if he was truly set on leaving. He wasn’t sure how much more of this he could take.

“If you think I am going to leave again and let you be killed by the Vampiric Council after everything that I’ve already done for you, you’re stupider than I thought,” Guillermo said, with a chill that had Nandor shivering slightly.

“Guillermo,” he whispered, and cursed his weakness yet again. He had meant for that to come out admonishing. Instead, it sounded suspiciously affectionate. He scrambled for some reason to make Guillermo leave. Anything to prevent more of his control from slipping. He was perilously close to disaster as it was.

“Who is stupid, you filthy human!” He instantly regretted saying.

Did people still wash their mouths out with soap? Perhaps Guillermo could recommend a good brand.

“No, what I mean to say is,” he tried again, but with an entirely different tone.

Guillermo didn’t let him continue.

“Nandor,” Guillermo insisted, and inched closer, unsure. “Do you really want me to leave? Really.”

Nandor swallowed hard, really considering the thought of Guillermo leaving, possibly forever.

He looked at Guillermo and for the first time in his living memory, he began to cry.

“Oh my god, what?” Guillermo exclaimed, as he was engulfed in a very strong and very wet hug.

“Guillermo!” Nandor said, overwhelmed. “I don’t want you to leave!”

Nandor was vaguely aware that he was doing exactly the thing he had fought with himself not to do since Guillermo swung down from the rafters in the theater.

The thought of Guillermo leaving was too much. He reasoned with his warrior side that it would have made any soldier break. Clearly he couldn’t be blamed. No jury in their right minds would convict.

He could feel more than hear Guillermo’s heartbeat pick up faster, and could sense his former-familiar’s hand grasping the single stake they had left him in the Blue Room. But he no longer cared. Guillermo had to know that he would never eat him, and Nandor had felt too many messy things tonight to care, at least at this very moment, whether Guillermo actually staked him or not.

He had lived so long already, anyway. There was a part of him that wondered if it would really take.

“I won’t leave you, Nandor,” Guillermo whispered, finally.

Nandor buried his face further into the soft chest in front of him and rubbed his cheek there, ass beginning to ache from the hard edge of the stairs he was currently sitting on.

Not that he cared. Guillermo always did have a comforting smell.

“M… Nandor?” Guillermo questioned, the hand with the stake coming up to loosely grasp at his back. Perhaps in a comforting gesture? “Are you...?”

But whatever it was Guillermo had been about to say was lost to the ether, because Colin burst in with a loud, “Hey-oh!”

The two sprung apart. Guillermo hid the stake behind his back quickly and Nandor faced the back of the room, willing his own stupid body to calm down. For once in his life, he was glad for Colin Robinson’s presence.

Guillermo clearly did not feel the same way.

“Dammit, Colin Robinson, what do you want?” He glared murderously.

Nandor shot him an impressed look, which Guillermo stoically, but blushingly, ignored.

“Oh sorry dudes! But the transport is here. We should skedaddle if we want to hit the road before the human assassins start showing up. Don’t take too long canoodling,” Colin chuckled. “You two rascals.”

Just as quickly as he had come, he was gone, leaving the previously closed door wide open.

Nandor and Guillermo shared a brief glance like they used to, and then they both visibility sobered.

“Oh!” Colin popped back in the doorway, eyes flashing blue again while he grinned manically.

“Colin Robinson!” Nandor accused, pointing a threatening finger while Guillermo paced in tight circles clutching his chest and taking deep, calming breaths.

“Guillermo, do you happen to want a job?”

His pacing abruptly stopped, and he succinctly and majestically replied, “What?”

“Yeah, um, before you fell asleep in the theater, I meant to offer you a job. Sorry, did I not say that? I have got to tell you, I don’t know where my mind is at lately. I mean, TGIF, am I right?”

Guillermo narrowed his eyes, trying to jive with the fact that it was a Tuesday morning, at best.

“You must have been pretty worn out already though,” Colin continued, “Because, well.” He mimed a swooning and laughed.

“You were out faster than I could say ‘paycheck!’ Whoops! My bad on that. Given your skillset, though, and my savings, I figured, why not? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been a patron, of sorts, although I must admit that previous recipients have been stand-up comedians, I think you can guess who, I won’t tell, but his name rhymes with Faniel Fosh…”

“You have money?” Nandor demanded, incredulous. Colin Robinson was Annoying, in the worst sense, but thankfully his presence had calmed Nandor down enough to feel more in control of himself again. His hot blood cooled considerably at the unexpected and unwelcome reappearance of the energy vampire.

“Oh yeah, man. Tons,” he unlocked and tapped on his phone without looking at it, while still addressing Guillermo. “I work and I don’t eat human food. Where do you think that money is going?”

Colin’s phone was shoved into Nandor’s face while he spoke to Guillermo, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Nandor scoff, roll his eyes, and then do a double take.

Colin Robinson continued.

“You would be amazed at how much material I can mine out of the topic of stocks and bonds, offshore bank accounts, etcetera. So, what do you think, Guillermo? We can hammer out details of salary later.”

Guillermo saw Nandor’s face in the harsh glow of Colin’s phone. He appeared to be counting zeroes.

“Shitting shit, Colin Robinson,” Nandor muttered, impressed despite himself.

“I would like to say that salary would be competitive, but I doubt this specific situation has ever happened before. I mean, it has certainly never happened to me in this specific way, so who would I be competing with?” Colin Robinson chuckled and slapped his thigh.

“But I digress… It would be more money than you have ever made in your life, I would guess, since you worked where again, before? Chipotle? McDonald’s? And anyway, we’d both benefit, I think… Not to mention--”

“Get to the point, Colin Robinson!” Nadja’s voice shot from the main entrance.

“Yes, as my good lady wife says, please conclude the bullshit, if you’d BE SO KIND,” he roared towards the end. “Fucking assassins after us and he has the nerve…”

“Hmm,” Colin considered for a moment with a finger on his chin. “Yum yum. This truly is a wonderful time.So think about it, will you? That’s all I ask.”

He made to leave again, and then popped back again, nearly tittering with glee at their annoyance.

“Ha! Terrifying, also, you know? It is an extremely, life-threateningly, terrifying time. For me included. Sorry, all of this fight or flight energy is going to my head. It’s like crack for us energy vampires, dangerously addictive under normal circumstances, but you know, circumstances being what they are,” He gestured vaguely at the two of them. “I’ll just leave your first paycheck here? Again, negotiable, but we can kick the wheels on it later.”

Nadja shouted from down the hall again, but all that could be heard were vague screams and groans, followed by the sound of glass shattering.

He left with a chuckling wave and they could both hear his steps receding this time.

They both sighed in relief again, but didn’t look at each other for a long moment.

Guillermo looked at the check. 

“Mierda.”

Nandor made an inquiring sound and came over to look.

Nandor hissed appreciatively from over Guillermo’s shoulder.

“Nandor,” Guillermo prompted, and Nandor stepped back quickly. “I would be stupid not to take this job.”

Nandor hummed noncommittally, hoping that his trick of pretending really hard would work in this case, at least, to make Guillermo forget that just minutes ago Nandor had been crying and pleading with his former familiar to stay with him.

“Do you still want me to stay with you?”

Nandor couldn’t bring himself to look up, or say anything.

He nodded somberly. Guillermo thought maybe Nandor had thought that he was going for a stoic, fearless leader vibe, but it came off more as a cranky, pouting toddler.

Lucky for Nandor, Guillermo’s weak spot had always been Nandor’s moments of weakness like this.

“You know things need to change between us, right?” Guillermo prompted.

Nandor nodded again, with a hopeful gleam.  
“Yes,” he agreed, perhaps with more enthusiasm than Guillermo had entirely been expecting.

“Alright. Let’s get you packed,” Guillermo said softly, and started re-folding Nandor’s fancy coat. Nandor reached into his coffin and pulled out the said phone. Guillermo’s hands were full of fancy coat, so he placed it in Guillermo’s usual pocket in the seat of his jeans.

If his hand lingered a bit longer than necessary, well. Another Victimless Crime!

Guillermo made a choking sound and his face turned beet red, to which Nandor turned abruptly and busied himself elsewhere.

He hissed quietly to himself.

Shit.

Guillermo sat up front with Colin, unable to keep himself from checking the heavy black curtain blocking the front cab to the back, where the heavy coffins and suitcases were all stored. The sun beat down on the water to their left, and the greenery on the right was awe-inspiringly beautiful. Guillermo couldn’t say that he had ever seen anything like it outside of a TV screen.

But he couldn’t seem to enjoy the view.

“Are you sure they’ll be alright back there?” Guillermo asked, fully aware that he was sounding like a broken record.

“Oh they’ll be fine. They’re not sleeping very well, but they’re alive,” Colin smiled.

Guillermo tried to believe it this time, but couldn’t let go of a niggling sensation at the back of his throat.

“We should talk about the job a bit more, probably,” Guillermo began, leg jiggling nervously. He was hoping against hope that he wasn’t walking right into a Colin-Robinson-shaped trap.

“Oh, now is good? Alright.” Colin’s hands tapped the steering wheel briefly, as though giving himself for a drumroll for an epic feed.

“Firstly, thank you,” Guillermo began, and Colin looked over at him, nose wrinkled. “Second of all, if I’m going to work for you, we should set a ground rule. You don’t feed from me without my permission, and I won’t kill you. Sound fair?”

Colin Robinson cleared his throat and nodded.

“You got it, buddy. I can’t promise not to get residuals if you keep up whatever tension you have with Nandor though.”

Guillermo fought against the heat in his cheeks that he knew was rising despite himself.

“Fair enough,” he muttered lightly. He had kept it to himself for this long. Eleven years was a long time to bury his emotions. Shouldn’t be too hard to just keep it up, right?

Colin chuckled, breaking Guillermo out of his thoughts.

“Are we already breaking our agreement?” He demanded, affronted.

“Hey, man, chill out, just because I can see it doesn’t mean I’m eating it!” Colin made an awkward placating gesture that Guillermo supposed looked vaguely conciliatory.

“Can you just not… Not look?” He whispered, scandalized that perhaps Colin Robinson had always known about Guillermo’s secret love for his stupid, proud, vulnerable, relentlessly irritating former master.

Colin made a considering noise.

“Well, I can’t say as I’ve ever had to try, you know what I mean? But if it’s between you staying or going, I’ll give it a shot, I suppose.”

“Good,” Guillermo ground out, feeling sweat breaking out on his forehead and willing himself to take some deep breaths to calm down. As he came to realize that they were safe for now, and the adrenaline faded, he was left with a surging, dark dread. 

He was just now starting to realize how much of his human life he was leaving behind.

“What are you guys talking about?” Nandor demanded, overly casual, in the tone of someone who had held their tongue far past the point of endurance.

“Nandor, you great big turkey, shut up and let us sleep! Cursssse!” Nadja exclaimed from her own coffin.

“I say, everyone shut the fuck up or I will come out there and shut you up, so help me!” Laszlo added, helpfully, whilst audibly losing his shit.

Guillermo cleared his throat, and resigned himself a little more to his current situation. When they stopped for the night, he would have to call his mother and let her know… He didn’t even know what. He didn’t want to think about it. If he could get to a bank, though, he could order a new refrigerator and have it delivered to her. That might go some of the way to making it up to her.

The heart wants what the heart wants, he thought, unbidden.

“Ugh,” he added helpfully, feeling slightly carsick.

“What did I just say, Gizzierrrmo!” Laszlo exclaimed, with the energy of a dapper, aggressed spider monkey.

“Colin Robinson, I know I just said no feeding from me, but what if I just want to fucking sleep for a few hours and not hear my own thoughts stabbing me through my eyeballs for a little bit?”

Colin laughed gleefully.

“Well, you know, we can arrange that. You want to pick a topic, or should I just go for it?”

Laszlo was cursing to himself and punching at the inside of his coffin, ramping himself up to make good on his threat.

“Great. One sec,” Guillermo told Colin. He undid his seatbelt, and disappeared in the back.

Colin could only slightly hear what Guillermo said, but he could feel the British vampire’s ire fading and turning into cold, brick-shitting fear.

Colin’s grin flashed, feral.

Guillermo reappeared, mollified but exhausted, and rebuckled his seat belt.

“Cold War submarines?” He suggested, balling up his lumpy, full-of-stakes trenchcoat behind his head. He turned his head to the back and shouted, “Cold War submarines, you guys?”

Begrudging, muffled assent drifted from the back of the van.

If Colin Robinson hadn’t been busy driving, Guillermo was sure that he would have been rubbing his hands together and cackling like a cartoon villain.

“You know, I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship,” Colin began.

“You’re paying me for a service and I’m accepting your cannibalism so I can sleep!” He exclaimed, with an edge of hysteria.

“You got it, bud,” Colin Robinson replied affectionately.

Thankfully, it didn’t take long at all before sweet, blessed unconsciousness took away his worries.

When he next awoke, however, it was to his face being smushed into someone’s chest. Nandor’s chest, if he could guess by the growl rumbling from inside it. He was jostled violently, and moved to push his face away, because he certainly needed air, unlike some people.

Evidently, Guillermo had also instinctively, in his sleep, pulled a stake on Nandor and held it positioned against Nandor’s ribs, which didn’t help him feel much better about the situation, if he was pressed to say.

But Nandor only shouted and grasped Guillermo tighter.

“Guillermo, please, do not be so squirmy!” Nandor admonished, shifting his hold and then finally allowing Guillermo to lift his head and choke in some much needed air. “And please do not stake me right now,” he added, as an afterthought.

“What the hell, Nandor!” Guillermo began, and immediately silenced himself, grasping desperately for the fabric on Nandor’s back, the stake falling to the ground, and making a little thock sound a suspiciously long time afterwards.

Guillermo had made the unfortunate mistake of looking down.

They were hovering in the branches of an incredibly, ridiculously tall tree, In the middle of the night. It was cold. And they were very, very far up.

“Puta madre,” Guillermo spit out, among some other choice epithets. “Uh, Nandor?”

“Yes, Guillermo,” Nandor replied in a weird, distracted tone, eyeing the ground suspiciously.

“Why the fuck are we so high up?”

“Oh!” Nandor exclaimed, as though also noticing for the first time where they were, and realizing he might also need to explain the situation to Guillermo.

“Well, you see,” he began, “I was sleeping, and then I was awake, and then Nadja said, ‘Let’s go eat something,’ and I said ‘Yes very good idea,’ and then--”

“Nandor!” Guillermo exclaimed, trying very hard not to think of the last time Nandor had held him like this, and he had ended up in the hospital and then months of physical therapy afterwards that he could not afford.

“Alright, Guillermo, alright!” Nandor then had the gall to glare at him as though he was currently the one being extra.

“Laszlo suggested eating you,” Nandor continued conversationally, “So I set him on fire and well, now, here we are I guess,” Nandor responded, pressing Guillermo’s back against the solid trunk of the tree, and holding him with an arm across his chest until he got his balance on the thickest part of the obliging branch.

Nandor seemed to think that being pressed against a tree several hundreds of feet in the air would make him feel better. Seeing that Guillermo was still, inexplicably, Not Calm, he shoved Guillermo more firmly against the tree with one arm and then patted him gently on the head.

Like a dog.

“What do you mean, you set him on fire?” Guillermo asked, slapping the hand away.

Nandor’s kicked puppy look was not going to work on him this time. Oh, no. Not this time.

“Well, I--”

“Nandor, you absolute shit donkey!” Nadja yelled from the ground “I wouldn’t have let him eat Guillermo, did you have to set him on fucking fire!”

“How was I supposed to know you wouldn’t let him eat him?” Nandor shouted down at her, petulant.

“Because I told you so less than 24 hours ago you utter dick tinsel?” She exclaimed mockingly.

Laszlo then sauntered up to the clearing underneath the tree, gesticulated as his ruffled coat gave off little puffs of smoke.

“I must say, darling, if he wanted to kill me, he would have done it. As it is, I didn’t like that shirt anyway.”

Nandor and Nadja, at least, decided this was enough, and their bickering faded as they went somewhere else.

Guillermo recognized now, on some level, that Nandor was being protective and not homicidally negligent, like the time he dropped him and put him in the hospital for weeks, although he could not fully process it because he was hundreds of feet above the fucking ground.

“Fucking guy,” Nandor growled, and his grip on Guillermo’s shoulder and hip--Guillermo gulped audibly, realizing his current position as one he’d had a wet dream about, once upon a time, featuring Armand.

It had been his first. He remembered it with horrible clarity, down to the magma-hot shame of watching his Spiderman sheets go through the spin cycle as his mother shot him glaring daggers of Catholic shame from the kitchen.

He still couldn’t stand to look at any version of Spiderman without his face burning.

He whimpered and grasped tighter to Nandor, who stiffened and seemed to realize exactly what position they were currently in, ostensible danger gone and everything.

Guillermo willed his expression to be blank with the sternness of a particular nun he remembered from his childhood.

Instead of put Nandor off, however, his eyes went black and glowing, and he hissed quietly. His fangs gleamed in the near complete dark.

“Guillermo,” Nandor intoned, with a hint of pleading Guillermo had never heard before, particularly aimed at him.

“M-mast… Shit. Nandor?” Guillermo tried to reply, as though Nandor wasn’t salivating over him right now, his erection pressing insistently against his belly.

“You’re so…” Nandor gritted out, rutting up once. His nostrils flared.

Did Nandor just hump him? Surely he knew that you had to be on an airplane to join the mile-high club. Also, where would he even have heard of the mile-high club? They didn’t own a TV.

Guillermo, despite himself, let out some kind of sound that must have been between mind-spinning arousal and sheer terror, because suddenly, Nandor’s eyes refocused. He seemed to snap back to himself. He let go of Guillermo as though he was covered in holy water.

He looked confusedly at his hands, as though asking them how they could betray him like this.

Guillermo whimpered, gripping the tree trunk tighter. If he wasn’t so scared of heights now, he would be out of his mind turned on. The shame and terror were at some dizzying levels that had him all mixed up. It certainly didn’t help that all of his associations with sex were messily, inextricably tangled with deep, Catholic shame. All of this together felt like his fault, and was making it so much worse.

“Nandor… Can we get down? Please. I don’t want to fall again.”

If Guillermo didn’t know any better, and if it wasn’t so damn dark, he would have guessed that Nandor looked cowed.

“Guillermo, I…”

“On the ground, please,” he gasped.

Nandor gently brought Guillermo to the ground and took several steps, facing away from him, either pouting or shameful. Guillermo didn’t have the capacity at the moment to care which, although he was sure it would bother him later, when he least wanted it to.

“Where are we?” He said, breezing past his own discomfort to the best of his abilities. He didn’t want to wait for Nandor to start blaming him for Nandor’s lack of control. The vampire was clearly hungry. How long had Guillermo watched his master feed and seen how it affected him, sometimes? When the victim was very strong and militaristic, especially. He had known that Nandor had a thing for feeding on powerful people.

Fortunately, Nandor did not see Guillermo as any of those things. He had hinted at this and said so outright on many occasions.

He wasn’t going to fault Nandor for that. He knew what he looked like.

He also knew that vampires sometimes couldn’t control their hunger. He was still human, after all. You couldn’t be a human among vampires and not acknowledge that at the very least, humans were flawed.

And on that note, there was no bathroom in sight. The van could also not be seen.

Nandor floundered for something cool to say to save face, while Guillermo’s patience drained away.

That had been a shitty way to wake up from a Colin-induced sleep.

“The van. Where is it? And where’s Colin?”

Nandor appeared suddenly very angry.

“Colin Robinson?” Nandor shouted, ire, and voice, rising with an incredulous question. “I save your life from stupid Laszlo and the first person you want to see is Colin Robinson!”

“Nandor! I have to” he snapped, and stepped closer with a lowered his voice “I need the bathroom. I don’t know where we are. Can you bring me back to the van? At least?”

Nandor’s mouth shut with an audible click, and brushed past him, cloak whipping around him dramatically.

Just a couple of months before, Guillermo would have praised him.

Very cool, Master.

He reeled over how much had changed.

Nandor stopped and looked briefly over his shoulder. Guillermo followed.

The motel room wasn’t much, but, well. It wasn’t much. Apparently Colin Robinson, despite his secret wealth, was still going to be a jackass in as many ways as he could possibly get away with.

The truck was parked a block away, as Nandor told Guillermo on their mostly silent and heavily charged walk out of the woods and back to civilization.

Nandor handed him the key card sheepishly.

“Colin Robinson said for you to shower and sleep for a while. Everyone else is hunting,” He said.

Guillermo hummed and began checking the exits, securing the door, and checking the bathroom for a toothbrush. He crowed in triumph, finding several under the cupboard wrapped in stiff plastic, along with travel tubes of Crest toothpaste.

He was very much looking forward to a hot shower, as he couldn’t remember the last time he had been able to do so. It must have been at least two days ago, or several years. He was sure it was one of those. He rubbed his hair and felt the stiff curls still caked together from dried blood, in places.

He grimaced, and began unbuttoning his shirt.

Nandor made an odd coughing sound from his spot by the door, and Guillermo froze. He had completely forgotten Nandor was there. Until now, Nandor hadn’t lingered like this. If it was a choice between going off to hunt and talking to Guillermo, well. No contest. Until now, apparently.

Nandor seemed strangely hesitant to leave him.

“Nandor?” Guillermo prompted, fingers lingering on the third button down.

Nandor’s mouth gaped like a fish several times, opening and closing, until Guillermo realized what the vampire was staring at. His neck.

“Nandor… shouldn’t you hunt, too?” Guillermo said, hands falling to his sides, at a loss.

“Oh yes, any minute now, I will go, but, uh. Guillermo?”

“Yes Mas--Nandor?” Guillermo nearly snapped, annoyed with himself for still not dropping the M word. He was better than this.

Nandor’s eyes sharpened, and he hissed.

“Alright!” he shouted, affronted. “I’m going then!” He stomped out the door and slammed it behind him.

Guillermo rubbed a shaky hand over his face, and turned to the bathroom.

“Uh, Guillermo, wait!” Nandor said through the door, quiet and somewhat shy, and Guillermo stopped.

“Yes, Nandor,” he said, gently, trying to compensate for his previous tone.

“I will be back soon. Please, uh. Stay safe. And don’t forget to lock the door,” Nandor’s voice trailed off, and Guillermo, disbelieving, strode to the door and three steps and wrenched it open, to check.

Unfortunately, he only caught the faint squeaking of a bat flying away into the darkness, and he stared off in what he hoped was its general direction before going back inside and locking the door carefully.

Nandor sure was acting weird.

That was really all that he could conclude about it.

He had never seen him act this way towards anyone except romantic interests, and those were always spectacularly pitiful in their endings. It was ludicrous to even suggest that Nandor would feel romantically about him.

Again, he knew what he looked like. And he knew how Nandor felt about him.

The last donut in the case.

He shrugged grimly, and got into the shower, hoping to wash away at least some of the worries that weighed down on him, and groaned under the hot water.

Colin Robinson seemed like he might be an okay boss, as long as he kept his promise of not draining him every time he felt like it. Guillermo would need to be careful to keep his emotions in check around Nandor, though. It wouldn’t be very good if Guillermo felt something really big suddenly and Colin drained him on instinct, knocking him out again. Guillermo wouldn’t be very much use as a bodyguard or mercenary or whatever then, would he?

Nandor sure was acting weird, though.

It nagged at him like a toothache.

Guillermo wondered why? The thing in the tree was… Terrifying, sure, but also excruciatingly hot. Right? But which one was it? Guillermo’s brain couldn’t parse it. Which one did he want to think of it as, and which one would help keep them all alive longer?

He couldn’t think straight about any of it, and damn it all, he was getting hard.

No, Guillermo wouldn’t think about that right now. Not in the shower, and not when anyone could return at any moment.

He tried a mental inventory, and started at the next problem.

Nadja and Laszlo seemed to be coping well enough, he thought. Although he had to admit that he hadn’t seen very much of them since they had left, and it had only been driving, and driving, and driving, some yelling, then some more driving.

Laszlo could be a wild card, when it came to stressful situations. Either he handled it with careless grace, or he was a centuries-old child about it. There was really no in-between. Guillermo guessed that he would just need to adjust a little. Nadja would help him through it, like she always did.

Speaking of Nadja, why had she called Nandor a coward in the house, when he had been sneaking around on Guillermo? That caught on his stream of consciousness like a chipped nail on a wool sweater.

He bit the inside of his cheek and turned off the water, finally. While he was busy getting dressed and settling into bed, he was at least distracted enough from his own brain that he could stop thinking the thoughts he didn’t want to have.

It was worse when he finally laid down, however. He tossed and turned, getting increasingly frustrated when sleep just wouldn’t come.

The adrenaline running through him was still very high. The slight scrapes on his palms from the tree he had woken up in had stung in the shower, but now looked insistently pink. They throbbed, and he glowered at them in the dark.

“You’re keeping me awake,” he whispered at them sullenly.

“No I’m not!” He heard Nandor’s voice to his right, and he jumped out of bed, with a stake he hadn’t even been aware he had been holding.

“Guillermo!” Nandor yelped, wounded. “Again with the stake! Do you really want to kill me that badly? I don’t think I was being that noisy!”

“Nandor,” Guillermo started, and dropped the stake on the floor in the general direction of his trenchcoat. He turned on the light. “I thought you were going hunting?”

“I did,” Nandor replied, defensively.

“Did you?” Guillermo arched his eyebrow.

“Yesss,” he hedged.

“Alright, fine. Since you’re here, and I can’t sleep, we need to talk,” Guillermo said, and got out of the bed.

Nandor’s sudden expression of panic could not be understated.

Guillermo pulled the covers back over the sheets and sat on the edge of the bed, looking at Nandor, who was now reclining warily on the other bed.

“Talk about what?” Nandor played with a loose thread on his sleeve and feigned nonchalance.

“You know what,” Guillermo deadpanned.

“No, I’m not sure that I do,” he responded, petulant, but sitting up straighter against the headboard and placed his booted feet on the covers, perched as though preparing for some kind of impact.

“Nandor,” Guillermo began with a heavy sigh. “What am I, to you?”

Nandor was really going to town on that loose thread.

“What do you mean, Guillermo?” He muttered, staring intensely at the damned sleeve-thread.

“Can’t you even look at me?” Guillermo demanded, close to losing it.

Nandor was frozen, unable to say or do anything. If he moved, he would betray himself, he was certain. He knew it would happen, and he knew that eventually he would not be able to control himself, but he couldn’t seem to keep himself away.

It was maddening.

“Damn it, Nandor,” Guillermo lunged at him, cross and stake in each hand.

Briefly, Guillermo saw Nandor’s eyes widen and freeze completely like a deer in headlights.

“Look at me!” He commanded, cross hovering in Nandor’s face and the stake pressing into his chest.

Nandor hissed but went limp, hands falling to the sides of his head with light thumps.

He looked up at Guillermo pleadingly. What exactly he was pleading for, Guillermo couldn’t say.

His head was spinning too fast. If he had had any previous experience with how he was feeling right now, he might have been able to stop what happened next, but he wasn’t sure exactly how.

For starters, he had never felt so powerful in his life. Nandor the Relentless was under him on a bed in a dingy hotel in the middle of nowhere, pliant and panting underneath him while Guillermo held him in place with a stake and a cross.

The latter appeared to be searing off some flesh, but Nandor remained frustratingly still and docile.

“Tell me what you want from me!” Guillermo begged, looking for something, anything to stand on and be sure about. Nandor had been his Master for eleven years. Now, Guillermo was in charge, and he didn’t know what to do.

It felt good to be powerful, sure, but he needed to know there was something that he could count on. Something from his old life that still made sense to him.

Otherwise, he would fall back to the only other thing in his life that made sense to him; killing vampires.

And for some reason, despite the mistreatment and abuse over the years, Guillermo couldn’t find it in him to kill the current vampire in question.

Nandor whimpered and squirmed oddly. He seemed to be trying to twist sideways. His expression was indescribable except for a note of sheer panic.

He could have fought back at any point, Guillermo reasoned. He had seen him do it before. He had been expecting it, even, for Nandor to shove him back into the wall, pin him there, and then berate him for his behavior, but all that happened was Nandor averting his eyes nervously and wriggling.

“What are you doing?” He scoffed.

The stake in his hand had somehow found its way to Nandor’s jugular, while the cross was pushed into the mattress under Guillermo’s weight. He held himself up with it as he hovered over Nandor’s rapidly blinking, and swallowing face.

“You don’t want to know what I want from you!” Nandor finally wheezed out, grimacing in pain, and Guillermo vaguely noted steam arising from the wound under the cross.

He threw it to the wall, where it lodged in the plaster and Guillermo silently apologized to it, imagining that it was looking at him balefully, much like the priest who had given him his first communion.

His hand now found purchase on the sizzling shoulder, and he bore his weight down on the wound, as Nandor hissed.

Guillermo was half out of his mind, and quickly losing the rest of it.

“I’m asking you, aren’t I?” He couldn’t help but shriek. “What are we? I’m not your familiar anymore, but you can’t leave me alone! What do you want from me now? What more could you possibly want?”

Nandor moaned loud and bucked his hips involuntarily.

That was when Guillermo felt an unmistakable hardness prodding at his ass, and he froze suddenly, mouth in a grim line, eyebrows high and shocked.

Rather than say anything to break this spell, whatever this was--could he be dreaming? Could everything, starting eleven years ago since he quit Panera Bread be one long delusion?--he ground his ass down, back and forward, once, to be sure.

It was all still under the auspices of plausible deniability, wasn’t it? They were all under a great deal of stress. If someone had an erection when they shouldn’t, well. Shit happened, didn’t it?

Nandor bucked up again, blissed out, and panting like an animal.

“You Motherfucker,” Guillermo ground out, suddenly, blindingly, darkly angry that Nandor had chosen now, for this.

Now, when he was farther from wanting vampirism than ever that he gets this, this stupid thing that what he had always wanted, had hoped he would get when he had deemed himself worthy enough, and even then he had imagined it would have been received  
in extremely different circumstances. If at all.

“G-Guillermo--” Nandor began.

“You sick fuck,” Guillermo accused, pressing the stake into Nandor’s throat until in drew the tiniest bead of blood.

Guillermo watched it, both dispassionate and hornier than he could possibly describe, as it rolled from the white throat to the blanket beneath them.

Nandor gasped and went limp, eyes unfocused at the ceiling, grinning like a sunning cat, blinking slowly.

“Did you just…” Guillermo began, disbelieving, and felt an unmistakable wetness on his backside.

He cursed. He had never been this hard in his life. He couldn’t believe this was happening. He had never been this hard in the presence of another person in his life, either, and that person had just cum in their pants before Guillermo even realized what was happening.

Yet another thing for Nandor to rob him of, the selfish bastard.

In the back of his mind, Guillermo pondered through a frenzied haze that maybe this being his first time should have affected his demeanor and what he did next, to maybe pump the brakes and talk a bit more about their relationship, but he barely managed to pull his pants out of the way before shoving himself directly into Nandor’s waiting mouth.

He felt Nandor’s hands come to grasp at his bottom and push him into his own mouth, and Guillermo nearly lost it.

He gasped, and pressed the hands in place with relish before slapping one of them sharply, and then grabbing fistfuls of Nandor’s hair to yank and tear at.

“Hands on the bed!” He barked, and the hands fell back down, Nandor’s powerful fingers grasping uselessly at the air while he moaned sloppily around Guillermo’s erection. Guillermo fought against the stuttering of his hips.

“Fuck, Master, why did you have to…?” he trailed off grasping and pulling hard at the thick black hair on the head he was fucking. He was aware on some level that he was muttering a stream of nonsense that possibly included things like, “Why do you make me want to hurt you like this,” and “Kill you if you stop” but he honestly could not be pressed to recall.

For several moments, Guillermo could hear his own panting curses, and the sound of the bed springs squeaking quietly. For once in his life, he did not care who could hear that he was getting off. This was all of his teenage fantasies and wet dreams rolled into one powerful moment, and he deeply felt the rarity of it. He might not get another chance to have this.

He had to admit, however, that he had always imagined Nandor as the aggressor. It had just made sense, at the time. The power that Nandor held as an immortal being and a creature of the night had always been a seductive concept to him, in an abstract way. 

It had never been rooted in reality, though. It was never something that he ever thought could possibly happen.

This was very, very real, thought, he concluded, as a sharp incisor nicked the sheath of his cock and he gasped, shoving into Nandor’s mouth hard, and gripping the back of the vampire’s neck with a vicious handful of hair.

“I can’t believe you, you drive me up the fucking wall--All I needed to do was pin you down and--That’s really all it took?--Do you even know what I would do to you--!”

Nandor’s hips shoved uselessly into the air, hard again and ready for round two, apparently.

Guillermo scoffed, and said, “If you think I’m going to help you with that, you’ve got another thing coming.”

Nandor moaned, crazed, and his eyes turned black as he swallowed the tiniest drops of blood from the nick.

Guillermo warned, half-heartedly, that he was about to come, and that he wasn’t going to be pulling out.

Still angry, he shoved himself deeper into Nandor’s throat and threw back his head, gasping.

Let there be no doubt, Guillermo thought, that this was a fucking punishment. If there was anything that Nandor deserved, it was some fucking punishment. Nandor made a choking sound and his black, predatory eyes rolled back, to Guillermo’s immense satisfaction.

“Ah…” Guillermo pulled out gingerly and fell forward, hard, into the pillow Nandor’s head was currently resting on. “Shit,” he concluded, entirely wrung out.

Nandor coughed and swallowed rapidly several times, followed by some tiny sniffles that ripped at Guillermo’s heartstrings.

Shit. Had he ruined this? Had he hurt Nandor, in a way that Nandor didn’t want? Oh Jesus, he thought to himself, had he misread the situation? Everything had been crazy, was this another thing he would have to atone for?

He numbly pushed himself up and reached gently behind Nandor’s neck to help Nandor sit up. “Nandor, shit, I’m sorry, I… Are you okay? Did I hurt you? Oh, fuck,” he saw the wetness on Nandor’s face and puffy eyes.

They were the warm, brown eyes that Guillermo knew.

Nandor held up a hand, coughed once more, and breathed in shakily through his nose a few times, before his arms came up to engulf Guillermo in a tight squeeze. He let out a long, shaky breath and the tears seemed to stop, finally.

“No apologies,” Nandor’s voice rasped, brooking no argument, and if Guillermo could get hard again so soon, he was sure that he would have. “That was… I have no words. Perfect.” Nandor praised.

The sound of Nandor’s fucked-out voice, harsh from Guillermo’s dick having been there just moments before, was enough to make him lose his mind.

He whimpered, twitching all over, overstimulated in the best way. “I guess that answers most of my questions,” he admitted beathily, as he grasped Nandor’s shoulders from above and then attempted to smooth back out the thick black hair, which stood at every angle.

Guillermo couldn’t help but let out a shocked huff at the extent to which he was still, incredibly, turned on by this man. This person whose pelvis he was currently sitting on. This vampire. Whatever he was.

Nandor grinned sheepishly, and then he pulled Guillermo closer.

“I did not see before, what you were to me, Guillermo. Now that I do, I find that I do not want to let you go again. I hope that is fine with you,” Nandor whispered up at him, stroking his face and chest sweetly.

Guillermo considered for a moment.

Cracked plaster from the embedded cross in the wall crumbled to the floor pitifully, and they both turned their heads to look.

Nandor hissed halfheartedly, too lax to care, and thankfully the cross was buried far enough in the wall that it didn’t hurt him anymore.

“We still have to talk about all of this,” Guillermo said with a voice more composed than he would have predicted.

Nandor nodded, complacent. He had gotten what he wanted. The cat that got the cream.

“I know. Sleep for now. I will wake you when the others return,” Nandor pulled Guillermo’s head down onto his firm, brocaded chest. “We can talk more later,” Nandor assured, in a familiar, imperious way that made Guillermo grin.

Guillermo relaxed, finally, against a chest he had (until recently) believed would never rest under his head.

Being proven wrong was, for once, not so bad.


	2. Stasis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Nandor, stop,” Guillermo commanded.
> 
> Nandor shivered, but didn’t stop. He even grunted, the bastard.
> 
> “Are you kidding me?” Guillermo growled.
> 
> “Make me,” Nandor moaned.  
> Guillermo would, he really would, but the feeling of solid ground he had had just moments ago when he fell asleep was unceremoniously yanked out from under him once again. He had been sleeping, and enjoying it, for fuck’s sake.

One of these days, Guillermo was going to absolutely lose his gourd for being woken up before he was ready for it.

He was laying on his back with a hand under his pillow, clutching his stake. It was a usual sleeping position for him of late.

What was not usual, however, was that he was quickly becoming aware of Nandor’s forehead pressing down on his chest, while Nandor jacked himself, knees bracketing either side of Guillermo’s hips. He was hovering over Guillermo while he slept and masturbating like some kind of creep.

What made matters worse, he was rubbing his cheek into the fabric of Guillermo’s shirt and sniffing deeply, while making incredible panting sounds that punched the breath out of Guillermo in a short, staccato burst.

Guillermo would have moaned in his appreciation, but the bed was shaking.

It would have been too ridiculous.

“This motherfucker,” Guillermo groused, almost too tired to be this turned on, and then froze, worried that Nandor would stop if he knew that Guillermo had woken up.

He supposed he needn’t have bothered, since Nandor carried on, regardless.

Guillermo figured that Nandor must have been too distracted to notice that the stake was now clutched in Guillermo’s hand, hovering over Nandor’s neck.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Guillermo muttered thickly, with more command and volume. He was pissed off, not only for Nandor metaphorically slapping him awake with something so ridiculously sexy, but also just generally pissed off. You could only wake up unrefreshed so many times before you lost your goddamn mind.

Nandor apparently had that effect on him.

Nandor froze briefly, and then sped up his jerking arm. It was clear he was going to try to come before Guillermo could stop it. Of course, Guillermo told himself. Of course Nandor would make a game out of this.

“Nandor, stop,” Guillermo commanded.

Nandor shivered, but didn’t stop. He even grunted, the bastard.

“Are you kidding me?” Guillermo growled.

“Make me,” Nandor moaned.

Guillermo would, he really would, but the feeling of solid ground he had had just moments ago when he fell asleep was unceremoniously yanked out from under him once again. He had been sleeping, and enjoying it, for fuck’s sake.

How the fuck was he supposed to make Nandor stop? He was half asleep still. And he was half hard already.

Guillermo groaned, exhausted, turned on, and pissed off about it.

“Anyone could show up at any second,” Guillermo insisted, his hand tightening and beginning to sweat around the stake.

Nandor gasped and then, Guillermo couldn’t believe his ears, giggled.

“I know,” Nandor said, extremely happy with his life choices.

Guillermo scoffed, thinking, yeah, that checked out. Leave it to Nandor to do this to him when all he wanted was some sense of normalcy. With Nandor around, it would be a circus every second of every day, unless he manipulated the situation to his will.  
Unless he beat the situation senseless until it complied.

This was all slowly coming into focus for him, and he pivoted against the bed with his feet, trying to move Nandor off of him.

Unfortunately for him, this only offered the realization that Nandor had him pinned under the covers. He was literally trapped by Nandor, while Nandor got himself off. Because of course he was.

Nandor giggled again.

“If you don’t stop me before I come, I’ll eat you, Guillermo,” he laughed, and bit off a moan. “I only got a drop of you before. I bet the rest of you tastes so…”

He didn’t get the chance to speculate further, because Guillermo had finally had enough.

He shoved with all of his strength, and it turned out, that was quite a lot.

Nandor flew off the bed, and landed halfway across the room on his ass. He would have rolled ass upwards and over, too, if Nandor hadn’t clawed at the carpet with his fingers like a large cat.

Nandor hissed, fangs bared, and grinned playfully.

Guillermo figured he would have looked pretty scary, or possibly cute (but probably not, because he was an asshole) if his dick wasn’t out with his pants halfway down his thighs.

Guillermo threw the covers off of himself, exasperated, and twirled the stake through his fingers.

Yeah, it was showing off, but Nandor liked a bit of flash, didn’t he?

Nandor made a move to get up from the ground, hands still out in claws. He looked like he was having the time of his life.

Before Nandor could get the chance to parry, Guillermo lunged.

And then instantly, before Nandor could make sense of it, the stake was already an inch into his chest. It had barely penetrated the breastbone, directly in the center so he knew Guillermo wasn’t trying to kill him--yet--but the wood stung and sizzled against his flesh.

They both stood there staring at one another in shock, both trying to make sense of what had just happened.

Nandor continued to live, and Guillermo admitted to himself that it was too far centered and far too shallow to be a killing blow, but felt a thrill at the close call nonetheless.

Guillermo then shoved Nandor back against the wall while he was still on his ass, and grasped the front of Nandor’s shirt.

“I know you don’t want to hear this right now,” Guillermo said, “Since you’re having a good time at my expense and all,” he rolled his eyes, “But I like my sleep.”

Nandor sneered.

“You never sleep. Since when did you like to sleep?” He said, incredulous, and quite angry that there was a stake in his chest.

He would get to that, though. Guillermo had caught him off guard with such an off-topic. What did any of this have to do with sleep?

Besides, Guillermo should have understood the game right away and followed along, like he had last night. What had happened? Nandor would have understood being thrown around a little, being hit, maybe some restraints--now there was an idea--but the stake? Yes, the threat was understandable, but wasn’t Guillermo crossing a line?

“Guillermo, did you really have to--”

“Do something like this again and I’ll make you really regret it,” Guillermo continued, low and dark, and Nandor shivered, for entirely different reasons.

“Do you understand?” Guillermo whispered next to Nandor’s ear.

Nandor searched for Guillermo’s eyes, and met them, gauging how much of this was play and how much of it was something truly dangerous.

“I said,” Guillermo repeated, harshly, “Do you understand?”

Nandor’s first instinct, prior to the events of the past few days, would have been to laugh. Guillermo of before couldn’t possibly follow through on that threat. Looking at him right now, he looked the same as he always did, but now, Nandor knew better.

Nandor hissed in a pained breath, looked down and watched as the soft human hand he had watched fold his laundry for eleven years wrap around the stake slowly. He was showing Nandor that death could come swiftly at his hands, that it would take nothing at all. All it would take was an upwards, slightly to the left, abrupt shove.

He was making Nandor wait for it, to see what he would do. Waiting for Nandor’s answer.

This was part of the game, wasn’t it? Nandor had started the game sure of the rules, but suddenly he had some questions.

Guillermo twisted the stake.

Nandor yelped. He could feel splinters veering from the grain and lodging in the sinew and muscle buried there.

This wasn’t going at all how Nandor had expected.

“I think sometimes you know exactly what to do to make me crazy. What did you expect I would do, when I woke up just now, and you threatened to eat me?” Guillermo wondered, fingers still grasping the stake and prodding it slightly.

Nandor whimpered.

“I don’t…”

“You really don’t know?” Guillermo pondered, as if to only himself. “No, I guess you don’t. Hmm.”

“I didn’t expect you to stake me!” Nandor yelled back, hurt and yet inexplicably still not attempting to murder Guillermo. He had considered it in the past. Why was it that now, with a stake partway into his chest at his familiar’s hand, it was further from a possibility than ever?

“You seem fine,” he replied, although distantly wary, himself.

“Guillermo,” Nandor began, feeling like he had fundamentally misunderstood last night, and feeling woozy at the implications of it. What if Guillermo actually hated him now? That would put an entirely different spin on the things they had done.

Guillermo reached up and held Nandor’s cheek, searching in Nandor’s eyes for… something.

He thought with a furrowed brow for a long moment, while Nandor fought with himself to not start yelling at Guillermo for staking him, making him think that Guillermo didn’t care for him. If he did that, he felt it was much too close to a precipice that they were already hobbling in dangerous proximity to.

Nandor wasn’t sure how much sincerity he could handle in one sitting.

“I can’t believe I have to say this to you, but I’m a virgin, Nandor,” Guillermo said angry and shameful.

In response to this, Nandor felt three things simultaneously:

Firstly, he said, “Shit,” and huffed out a mirthless laugh.

Secondly, shit, like for real, that meant that Guillermo might need some more guidance than being thrown in the deep end like he had kind of forced him through last night and just now, waking up.

Thirdly, how had he never connected Guillermo’s virginal smell to actually being a virgin? Fuck, Guillermo had been so close all this time, had been virginal, and Nandor could have had him at any time? Opportunities missed danced in front of his vision, taunting him.

And fourthly, it occurred to him in a sobering wave that he might need to be a little more careful. Virgins were his thing, yes. Furthermore, Guillermo was turning out to be more his thing than anything or anyone had ever been in the past.

More specifically, if they weren’t careful, Nandor might bite him, eat him, and not realize what he had done until after Guillermo was already done. If Nandor bit him while they were… shit… being intimate? Could he think about “fucking Guillermo” when he now knew that Guillermo was a virgin? Fuck. Hot. Too much. Not enough. In any case, if he bit him while fucking him, while taking Guillermo’s virginity, it would impossible stop himself from eating all of Guillermo all up.

That would kill Guillermo for sure.

He wanted to eat Guillermo desperately. He was sure Guillermo tasted like paradise.

But there was also the stake; and the serious, considering look in Guillermo’s eyes. Not to mention the fact that he couldn’t stand the thought of Guillermo’s life fading away like one of his throwaway victims. The light going out of his eyes, being buried in the ground and rotting there, never to touch Nandor, talk to him, or look at him ever again.

It had been a long time since Nandor had had to think of the implications of the death of someone he actually cared about, and he did not like it. It was unpleasant, somewhat like the grief he had felt at his great-granddaughter Madeline’s death, but a thousand times heavier and worse.

In which case, he needed to think about this a little bit harder before the words came out, or he would fuck it up irrevocably. He needed Guillermo to know his limit here or one of them would die.

They would need to be much more careful.

If he ate Guillermo up and Guillermo died, Nandor wasn’t even sure what he would do. Maybe bury himself in the ground and wallow for a century or so. Tie himself to a streetlight and wait for the sunrise. Insult Laszlo’s skill in the art of topiary and then stand still for less than a minute. A swift death. Something to either make himself suffer for a long time or end the suffering quickly.

If Guillermo killed him, on the other hand, he wanted to think that Guillermo would make the same kinds of dramatic shows of grief that Nandor himself would, but there was a part of him that doubted that would happen. Guillermo was better capable of caring for himself without Nandor, in fact would probably be better off without Nandor, than ever before.

Nandor’s chest constricted.

And the final option, he knew for certain that if he turned Guillermo into a vampire at this point, Guillermo would kill him anyway. They had yet to talk about it, but if Nandor himself had found out that he was related to a famous and powerful vampire slayer, Nandor wouldn’t have wanted to be turned into a vampire either.

None of those scenarios sounded great. So despite how hot it was that Guillermo had been (mostly) untouched, how crazy thirsty it made Nandor, they needed to pump the brakes.

This needed some more consideration. It would still be hot, but first, they would need to ensure that neither of them would die. So they could keep doing it for as long as possible, thank you very much.

“I can tell you what to do,” Nandor breathed, willing his face to be blank, but he was sure it was full of dreamlike longing. “But you’re going to need ropes that will hold me even if I struggle.”

Guillermo huffed out a pained breath.

“Fuck,” he complained, as he sat back on his heels. “I keep hoping that the things coming out of your mouth won’t make me harder than ever, but then you say something like that.” He let out a steadying breath.

Nandor made a noise of pained agreement.

“I wonder if we brought any silver rope with us?” Guillermo asked.

Nandor’s mind flashed back to the theater, when he had imagined Guillermo prowling up to the stage, pulling back the ropes and kissing him.

He whined, closing his eyes against the onslaught of emotion.

How much he wanted that right now.

They hadn’t even kissed yet. There was so much left to discover with Guillermo, so much left to show him and do to him. So much for Guillermo to do to Nandor.

The possibilities were endless. But the pace would definitely need to be slowed way the fuck down.

“There must be something we can do until we can get it,” Guillermo leaned closer, on his knees in front of Nandor.

“Your lips, Guillermo,” Nandor breathed.

Guillermo seemed to realize it for this first time himself, and he leaned in slowly, eyebrows knit together with emotion, pressing his forehead to Nandor’s, and shyly holding back, despite the aggression he had shown earlier.

When a vampire had lived as long as Nandor had, eventually there wasn’t much left to experience in terms of novelty. The boredom could be overwhelming. Everything worthwhile had already been seen, felt, done. Life was boring--predictable.

But this person in front of him now, pushing a stake into the cartilage of his chest to make a point and leaning down to kiss him, was entirely new to him. He had known him for over a decade and yet, here he was, surprised once again. It was amazing. 

Wonderful.

This amazing human, his fierce and powerful Guillermo, looked down at him passionately, breathing in quick, short bursts.

They were so close.

Inside, Nandor could feel the furniture of his mind starting to move around, feelings that had not been touched in centuries were creaking out from under the layers of dust, grasping with skeleton fingers out into the light again.

Nandor could not possibly hope to articulate what was being unearthed inside him, but a wiser person might have said something about balance. Somewhere inside him, He knew that living in this world required a certain amount of give and take. He knew there had been a balance for him, once. For a life taken, there was a price to be paid. In centuries of murder and monstrousness, his scales would never be re-balance. His very nature as a vampire demanded it.

Guillermo was looking down at him with tenderness, hurting him, humiliating him by having defeated him, owning him--These things were so small, merely a drop in the water, but to Nandor it was an ocean.

He knew that Guillermo would understand. He was perhaps the only one who had ever understood him this well and this deeply.

“You want me to kiss you?” Guillermo said softly, seriously, possibly a little giddy.

The gentle voice of his familiar at complete odds with the stake partially buried in his chest, sent a wave of arousal and relief through him. He tilted his head back wantonly.

“Yes,” Nandor whispered back, eyes glassy. “Kiss me, Guillermo,” he begged.

“I thought so,” Guillermo responded, and rubbed his hands all over Nandor’s front and sides, tickling him a little. He didn’t even notice Nandor’s little huh sound and twitch away from the stimuli, he just breathed in shakily and stared at the trails his hands left in the cloth.

Nandor shook his head, as though waking from a spell.

“Guillermo--” He began, offended, but Guillermo interrupted him.

“Ask again,” He said, grasping both of Nandor’s shoulders and pressing. “Anything,” he promised, “What do you want from me right now?”

Guillermo’s lips were quirked in such a way. Could be a hint of playful contempt. Perhaps a searching look. There was a secret that Guillermo wanted from him, but was playing a game with him instead.

Guillermo knew what Nandor wanted. He could have given it to him right away, but instead he was playing a game.

Alright. Nandor would play along.

“Kiss me,” he pleaded. His head was tilted back in supplication.

Guillermo leaned forward, closer, and closer, until Nandor could feel the soft puffs of air from his exhales.

“No,” Guillermo said, pulled back, and in one move, ripped the stake out.

Nandor howled.

He fell forward, bracing his hands on the floor, while little droplets of sizzling blood spattered below him. His hands grasped at the edges of the frayed carpet where he had caught himself before.

“What do you mean, ‘no’?” Nandor complained, dumbfounded.

“I mean, no,” Guillermo responded primly, as Nandor’s blood dripped to the floor. “Are you going to ask me what I want?” He prompted.

Nandor sat there, really trying to figure out if this was some kind of trick question. Of course, Guillermo wanted whatever Nandor wanted, didn’t he? Wasn’t that why he had become his familiar in the first place? Isn’t that what they were about to do right now?

And now his blood was on the floor, making him go crazy with frustration and thirst.

“What I want,” Guillermo continued, without waiting for Nandor to respond, because it was clear that he was out of his depth, “Is to punish you. Because that’s the only way you learn.”

Nandor all of a sudden understood, and smiled beatifically.

“I want to teach you a damn lesson. Do you want me to do that?” Guillermo asked him. Normally, the repetition would have irked him, but right now he was salivating like a dog who’s been promised a treat. You want a lesson, Nandor? Yes, how about a lesson? Good boy!

Nandor nodded, emphatically, embarrassingly close to panting and whining.

“Guillermo. Yesss.”

“Good,” Guillermo praised.

That’s when Guillermo picked up the cloak, let it run through his hands consideringly.

“G-Guillermo, we don’t need that right now. We’re supposed to be taking clothes off, not putting them on--”

He looked back at Nandor, the fearsome Nandor the Relentless, still on his knees with his dick out, hard as ever, but now a little confused.

Guillermo brought the cloak back over and showed it to Nandor, as though for the first time, and spoke.

“I’m going to gag you and then you’re going to get us both off. With your hands. I’m going to hold the stake. I’m probably going to slap you around. I’m still mulling it over. If you have a problem with that, now is probably the time to say so, because in about two minutes you’re not going to have much chance.”

Nandor’s jaw fell audibly, the rest of his blood rushing south too quickly for his undead body to comprehend.

Guillermo then tore a long strip off the side of Nandor’s cloak.

For a moment Nandor couldn’t understand what had just happened. In no reasonable world would Guillermo intentionally rip up Nandor’s clothing.

“Hey!” Nandor shouted in indignation, reality catching up with him. That was his Very Cool, Master cloak! He wore it specifically so that Guillermo would tell him how cool he was when he swished it dramatically. And Guillermo had just torn it!

“How many times have you told me ‘no’ in the past?” Guillermo asked calmly, with an edge to it.

“Hundreds?” Guillermo prompted.

Nandor sputtered, “My cloak!”

“Thousands?” Guillermo continued.

Nandor saw him approach close again and he swallowed hard, looking at the velvet cloth that would put a stopper in his mouth in just a few seconds.

“I’ve tried to come up with a good way to figure it out, really put a solid number on my suffering, but there’s really no use. So, Nandor…”  
Guillermo touched Nandor’s cheek tenderly, menacingly, with his free hand.

“If you learn this lesson well enough, I’ll kiss you as long as you want,” he promised. “But first…”

He trailed off.

Yes, Guillermo? He thought. He was waiting for an answer. What was going to happen first? He knew he should want to know, so he could decide whether to do it or not, but mostly he just wanted the kiss, and he realized abruptly that he would do anything to get it.

Unfortunately for the both of them, that’s when they heard the voices of Nadja and Laszlo, in quiet conversation as they approached the door of the hotel.

Their eyes, having been trained on one another already, shifted intentions with breakneck speed.

Nandor began by zipping himself back up and smoothing his hair.

Guillermo grabbed Nandor’s ripped cloak, and his phone in his arms before skidding into the bathroom, slamming the door, and turning on the faucet.

Nandor realized suddenly that the carpet had been ripped and there was no explaining it other than he and Guillermo had been fighting each other and about to fuck.

He stood with his arms open, looking between motel door and the bathroom door, but Guillermo was not there to help him with that one.

That’s when the door opened.

Thankfully, Nadja and Laszlo had not been in a human motel in a long time, and didn’t seem to find the horrible gashes in the carpet to be amiss. 

Of course, Nadja gave Nandor plenty of side-eye while Guillermo finished up in the bathroom, but said nothing about it.

For now.

“Nandor, what has happened to your shirt?” Nadja said, leaning over to run her hand over the stake-shaped and stake-sized hole.

Nandor sprang back and covered it with his own hand protectively. The wound had already healed, but the hole and the blood remained.

“Oh, it is nothing,” he said, fighting against a stammer, and visibly searched for a plausible story.

“It’s from the tree last night. Nandor almost dropped me and got caught on a branch on the way down,” Guillermo said.

Nandor looked over at Guillermo, wanting to tell him thank you, but painfully aware that the others were watching.

“Yes, Guillermo is very heavy, you know. Slippery, too. Almost didn’t catch him in time!”

“Oh, well thank goodness you did,” Nadja said deadpan, and examined the ceiling with something like exasperation.

Nandor was sure he would be forced to talk about this at some point in the near future. He knew it needed to happen. He was having too much fun with his little secret though.

It seemed that both he and Guillermo had agreed on keeping whatever this was quiet, as they had both acted instinctually, and on mutual terror, on hearing their alone time being interrupted.

Laszlo changed the subject, to the visible relief of everyone in the room

Unfortunately, that subject ended up being him sharing details of the humans they had just fed from.

The tension in the room was palpable.

Laszlo continued, apparently oblivious.

“Yes, we found him outside the grocery store, didn’t we darling?” Nadja said a little nervously, rubbing blood from her husband’s cheek and licking it from her finger.

“We did indeed. Little heavyset fellow, dark curly hair, glasses. Truly delectable,” he grinned, twiddling his thumbs.

“I feel like he tasted a little familiar, don’t you, my sweet syrup pie?” Nadja added.

Guillermo’s mouth set into a hard line.

“Yes, I do believe we’ve had someone like him before, my sweet syrup pie, although I cannot for the life of me place him…” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, eyeing Guillermo expectantly, with a sharp, toothy grin.

Guillermo merely watched them all from the wall behind Nandor. Silent and waiting.

“Where’s Colin Robinson?” Guillermo asked, and all vampire eyes lit on him again, all traces of smiles gone.

Nandor felt his hackles rise. He knew it was ridiculous to be jealous of the energy vampire; there was no evidence that Guillermo cared at all for him, but it bothered him anyway. He wanted Guillermo all to himself. Wrapped up with a red silk bow. At Nandor’s mercy.

There was also the unnerving situation of having his closest and oldest friends look at his familiar with something approaching aggression tinged with a hint of bloodlust. Nadja, he knew, would do her best not to kill and eat Guillermo, but they were in something of a desperate situation.

That also meant that Laszlo could be unpredictable. And who knew what Nadja would be upset over and what she would shrug off. Anything could happen.

For the first time in his undead life, he was feeling protective of someone’s life other than his own. It was new and different. Thrilling.

Nandor was having a really hard time talking himself down after Guillermo had ramped him up to this point. He was going to get the blue balls if they couldn’t fuck soon. Damn Nadja and Laszlo for coming back too soon!

Although thank goodness that had, or he might have eaten Guillermo all up… It was a conundrum. Nandor was starting to think he might understand why Nadja and Laszlo were so damn horny all of the time. They were perverts, of course, but if Nandor was married to Guillermo like Nadja and Laszlo were, he too would want to fuck all of the time, and all over the house, in all manner of ways.

Laszlo answered Guillermo’s question with less information than he knew Guillermo wanted.

Guillermo tried not to visibly roll his eyes. He could tell that the vampires were testing him. They wanted to start a fight so they could see what their new limits with him were. Possibly see what he was actually capable of towards vampires he ostensibly cared about.

But he didn’t want them like he wanted Nandor.

“Colin said we should feed without killing and then hypnotize the humans to forget, but where is the fun in that, I say,” He looked at Nadja for agreement and she nodded.

“Yes, exactly,” Nadja said, voice lowered.

“But did you kill humans just now?” Guillermo said, and at least two sets of offended vampire eyes lit on him.

“Gizziermo,” Laszlo began, “With all due respect, how is that any of your damn business?”

Nadja hissed at Laszlo, but made no attempt to deny that she agreed with her husband.

“Not my business?” Guillermo muttered. He had not moved from leaning against the wall next to the bathroom. He couldn’t sit, as all of the vampires were currently using all of the sitting space.

Nandor sat stiffly on the bed which he and Guillermo had gotten off together merely hours before. They had been about to do it again, Nandor thought spitefully, before they were so rudely interrupted.

“Guillermo,” Nadja said, placatingly, “It is just that, we are vampires, and you are not. Humans would not understand a vampire’s hunger. Nothing to do with you but in general, humans are stupid about this.”

“Yes my darling, that is exactly it, you’ve hit the nail on the head there.”

“Yes,” Nadja continued, “Vampires have certain needs, don’t they Nandor?”

Nandor hummed haughtily, perhaps seeming to agree, but trying vaguely not to get involved with whatever Nadja and Laszlo were trying to prove here.

Although…

Nandor suddenly realized. This would be a perfect opportunity to earn more punishment. What better way to get Guillermo really riled up than to insult him some more. Especially now that he had moral support behind it? They could, altogether, get Guillermo good and angry, and then Guillermo would do things to him with more viciousness than before. It was certainly a good look for Guillermo, Nandor believed with utter conviction.

Nandor fought back a shiver in anticipation. There was no need to think through that course of action any longer. Surely there would be no negative consequences, only resulting sexy times.

“Yes, vampire needs, you wouldn’t understand, Guillermo,” Nandor sneered down his nose, but upwards at Guillermo, who was the only one in the room on his feet.

“Is that so?” Guillermo said, quiet. Thoughtful. Not rising to any kind of argumentative bait that they were laying out for him.

Guillermo could follow Nadja and Laszlo’s reasoning like the back of his hand. They were so predictable.

Yes, Guillermo had killed a whole theater full of vampires not long ago, but perhaps it was a fluke. Beginner’s luck. Maybe he’d just prepared for it really well. Those preparations were surely not in place now, here, in this rotten motel.

Sure, they had completely forgotten about the long list of victims that Guillermo had claimed before the theater, but maybe that was a lie, too? Looking at him now, Guillermo seemed the same as always. Small, unthreatening, soft.

And yet, Guillermo stood over them, surveying them with a superior expression of his own. It gave an odd impression of authority, Guillermo’s head being above everyone else’s, them having to bend their necks to look up at him.

A familiar, unaware of his place?

Nandor rose to his feet and approached.

Guillermo moved not a single muscle, eyes trained on Nandor. Waiting.

Nandor reasoned to himself, already trying to justify what he was about to do, if Guillermo got angry enough, maybe he would kick Nadja and Laszlo out and then they could finish what they had started.

Surely what he was doing now was the best course of action towards returning to a more private, horizontal position with his former familiar.

“Yes, Guillermo. As you are still not a vampire, and not likely to ever be a vampire,” Nandor saw Guillermo’s eyes widen, “Do not presume to judge what the vampires should and should not do!”

He poked Guillermo in the shoulder combatively.

“Careful, Nandor,” Nadja intoned, and Guillermo could see Laszlo holding out his hand, as though telling her to wait and see what the stupid human would do now.

Before Nandor could make sense of it, he found himself barreling backwards into Nadja and Laszlo, who were hissing and yelling at Guillermo intensely with their fangs bared.

Guillermo had shoved him back. It was amazing that Guillermo had had the strength, again. Humans were usually weaker than this. Nandor would know, he had overpowered so many of them to their dooms.

He was getting up and trying to get his bearings while the other two postured at Guillermo, and looked for chances to strike.

He felt something in his chest constrict, and he couldn’t place why.

While Guillermo held the stake in front of him, standing sideways to reduce their target, there was a downward cast to Guillermo’s beautiful mouth now. Despite the two vampires hissing at him and about to strike, he also did not appear to be scared.

What did he appear to be? Nandor would not have been able to guess, but it wasn’t the reaction he had been going for.

Yet again he found himself surprised by this human. It reminded him how much distance there really was between them, despite their recent physical closeness.

“Everyone shut up,” Guillermo said, and threatened them back with the stake. “I don’t care. The only reason I asked is that Colin Robinson and I both think that as a group, we shouldn’t draw attention to ourselves. Did you forget that you almost died last night? The Vampiric Council sent assassins every night for a month before they tricked you with that stupid, artistic, well-crafted but obviously a fucking trick, invitation.”

Nadja’s clawed hands were the first to fall, although Nandor merely stood in the corner behind the couple, distractedly staring into the floor in front of him, looking like a lost puppy.

“Do you want me to help you live through this,” Guillermo continued, “Or do you want me to kill you? Because right now, I could go either way.”

Colin Robinson spoke up, and everyone jumped.

No one had even heard the door open.

“Hi guys, what’s happenin?” He said.

There was a long silence.

“Nothing,” Guillermo said. He relaxed and put the stake away into one of the many pockets in his trenchcoat.

As he and Colin exchanged information and spoke about possible plans on where to go next, Guillermo met Nandor’s eyes briefly before sliding away, angry and hurt.

The look he had shared with Nandor made the vampire shiver. This was an entirely different kind of shiver than before. Before, he had been excited for impending sex. Now, he had the faint impression that sex was no longer in his immediate future. At certainly not with Guillermo.

Well! Nandor puffed out his chest, feeling anything but big. It was Guillermo’s fault for being so sensitive in the first place! It would have been obvious to anyone that Nandor had been trying to be intentionally misleading to the other two vampires. That he had only said what he did to make their sexy playfulness more fun. Give it an edge. He had only wanted Guillermo to be angry so that he would hit Nandor harder when they fooled around.

Guillermo should have known that!

Right?

The more he thought about it though, the more he inwardly winced. He had definitely done something wrong. He wasn’t going to examine it too closely, though, because damn. That was an uncomfortable feeling! He didn’t like it at all!

Outside, Guillermo surveyed their new vehicle with chagrin.

Colin Robinson had returned to the motel with the ugliest RV Guillermo had ever seen. It had rust spots around the tires, and the suspension was lower over the front driver’s side than the rest of it.

Not only this, it was some horrendous color between dark brown and olive green, with oily spots of sun damage, making it look vaguely like a discolored shitstain. Furthermore, as if that wasn’t enough, Guillermo came around to take a closer look at the driver’s side.

It looked like someone had attempted to airbrush a cheetah there, but another, more reasonable soul had stripped it away. Instead of removing all trace of the horrible, distended, disfigured attempt at a cheetah, it left behind a washed out, faded ghost of cringing mediocrity.

It gave the impression of overenthusiastic (but extremely unskilled) enthusiasm followed by repulsed regret.

Leave it to Colin Robinson to bring back an RV that looked exactly like Guillermo felt. He was beginning to suspect that Colin Robinson, despite their agreement, was still getting his jollies in where he could find them.

Guillermo would have to have another talk with him soon.

For now, he was just too tired and too overwhelmed to bother with it.

They needed to make it to some kind of safe place. As long as they were on the move, they were in danger.

The vampires seemed to sense that the confrontation from before would have to be brought up another time, seeing the slight tinge of light to the sky from the East, as they piled into the RV.  
Colin Robinson got into the truck, having bought what looked like an immensely expensive radio set, and told everyone that it had been a long night. He was going to eat up while chatting on the radio with some semi-truck drivers he had seen palling around at one of the rest stops along Route 23, between stints on the road.

He thought it best if everyone stayed in the other car, just in case Colin couldn’t control where the energy was being sapped from.

Guillermo called it a point in the energy vampire’s favor that Colin Robinson was making a face-value attempt, at the very least, to honor Guillermo’s boundary on this. Even if he was doing a rather poor job of it in every other function.

That’s how he found himself, in the early hours just before dawn, in the ugliest RV the world had ever seen, on Route 23 Northbound on the blandest, whitest most mediocre portion of Ohio.

They had been driving for an hour from the hotel with Colin leading the way in the truck and Guillermo following in the RV. The vampires were making sounds of bustle behind him, through the faux-wood accordion door that blocked off the front cab from the living area.

They were securing blankets and cloaks over the windows, while bickering softly over who got to sleep where.

Guillermo studiously, sullenly, ignored them.

Thankfully, Colin Robinson had also returned with burner phones. He had Nandor set their old ones on fire. Guillermo pocketed his sim card in the hopes that one day soon he would be able to go back to his family in New York.

He was re-listening to back episodes of one of his favorite podcasts in the hopes that it would help him forget how miserable he currently was, but it wasn’t making much headway.

For instance, he had yet to deposit that money and have that fridge delivered to his mother. When he had turned off his phone for the last time to remove the sim card, he had seen seventeen calls from her, and even more texts. She must have been worried out of her mind.

The farther they had gone from home, too, the worse he felt about it. He was wretched. He had disappeared from his family for a decade, only to return suddenly. He had only just begun to realize how much he had missed that human connection, his roots to his culture, his language, his family, when he had found that stupid invitation.

They were getting farther away from home by the second, and with each second, the less he felt like he had any control over his situation. Like he was leaving behind a world that had been a dream, and all along this nightmare had been the ugly reality behind the facade. He had just been too blind to see it.

His rose-tinted glasses were gone, now. Nandor had told him he would never become a vampire. Guillermo had dealt with a lifetime of disappointments. While it was true that he was still unsure if he wanted to be a vampire anymore, he had still been hoping that Nandor would at least keep the promise in offer, if only in name rather than action.

He didn’t have to follow through. Maybe Guillermo didn’t want it. But to remain willing, at the very least--

Guillermo tried not to hate himself too much for trusting the word of a vampire, yet again. How much experience had he had in the past with the flimsy nature of their wills? He should have known better. At times, and selfishly, their intentions could be an indomitable wall. You might as well shout at the wind.

At other times, and regarding the lives of others, it was as fragile as spun glass.

Nandor silently opened the folding door between the front cab and the rear living area. He shut it firmly behind him to Nadja and Laszlo sleepily hissing at him to be careful.

It was a mere hour to sunrise. Already the sky was beginning to glow in the east, from what Guillermo could see of it in his rearview mirror.

Soon they would be heading north, and the sun would be in the east. Nandor would get the brunt of it.

Guillermo debated with himself to make mention of it.

He instead decided to ignore Nandor to the best of his abilities.

Nandor plopped himself down uncomfortably into the passenger seat and spread his legs.

“Seatbelt,” Guillermo muttered.

“Yes that was rather awkward, wasn’t it?” Nandor said, uncomfortably, shifting in his seat.

“I said put on your seatbelt, Nandor,” Guillermo said, louder.

“Oh,” Nandor said, nonplussed. “Yes, of course.”

He pulled too hard on it and ripped it. Thankfully not all the way.

Now, the thing hanging on by maybe an inch, Nandor gently pulled the belt and buckled it into place over his broad chest.

Guillermo sighed hard and kept his eyes on the road.

“Where are we going?” Nandor asked, unsure what else to say. Guillermo still seemed mad at him, although he could not think of why. Perhaps instead of starting a fight, he could keep Guillermo talking until he stopped being angry.

That had worked before, at some point, hadn’t it?

Yet another reason for Nandor to wish he had been paying more attention to Guillermo before all of this. He was in new terrority. It was uncomfortable as hell.

In any normal situation, though, Nandor would be avoiding discomfort like this. He just couldn’t keep himself away. It was like Guillermo pulled Nandor like a magnet, or Guillermo himself like a drug that Nandor just couldn’t kick.

“Michigan,” Guillermo replied shortly.

“Ah, Michigan.” Nandor commented, as though he knew anything about it.

“It’s just north of Ohio,” Guillermo said.

“I know where Michigan is,” Nandor began, affronted, and then took a breath.

“That is not what I meant to say,” Nandor continued.

Guillermo was silent.

“I am used to things going my way,” Nandor said, half to himself, and frustrated with himself for Guillermo’s continued silence.

They had been almost affectionate merely hours before this. If you could call that affection. Nandor wished they could go back to that.

“No shit,” Guillermo scoffed.

Nandor looked out the window at the flat, uninteresting terrain of northern Ohio.

“I want to try harder to understand you, Guillermo,” Nandor said, sneering at the horrible, bland surroundings providing a backdrop to his heartfelt confession. Would that it were steep cliff faces and long drops into rugged alpine valleys.

“Do you really,” Guillermo replied tonelessly.

“Yes!” Nandor snapped, not liking this unresponsiveness. It put him on edge. “I thought that was clear with…” Nandor trailed off. It was hard for him to say these things out loud. 

He would have much preferred to show Guillermo how he was feeling. Action had always been easier for him than talking and emotions.

But there was not much the two of them could do, on the freeway at 6:45 in the morning on route 23 Northbound freeway in Ohio on a Sunday morning, with Nadja and Laszlo in the back. Nothing but a flimsy faux-wood accordion door between them.

“With what, Nandor?” Guillermo said loudly, and then repeated much quieter, “How are you showing me that you are trying to understand me?”

Nandor floundered visibly for words.

“You know these things are difficult for me, Guillermo…” he trailed off, hoping against hope that Guillermo would back off, like he had so many times in the past. He looked at Guillermo intensely, hoping he could push it into Guillermo’s head through staring hard enough.

“Yeah? You know what else is difficult? Growing up an awkward, fat, gay, Catholic, Latino kid in the Bronx, who finds out that vampires exist in some kind of epic universal gift of wish-fulfillment, finding the coolest and sexiest vampire to be a familiar to for years, finds out it’s the worst thankless indentured servitude since serfdom, falls in love with him anyway, and then finds out that that vampire is the most selfish, uncaring, promises-breaking pendejo that the world has ever seen!”

Guillermo continued to insult him in Spanish, although Nandor admittedly did not follow it from there.

Nandor swallowed a few times to keep in his emotions. He felt like a child. Unable to control himself. He had never been insulted like this, not even as a human. No one had ever dared. It was thrilling, but also made him want to crawl into a dark hole somewhere until he disappeared from existence.

Nandor the Relentless, vampire, was unable to make the person he cared about feel cared for. He had made Guillermo feel this way. Not even only before he discovered that Guillermo was a sexpot. Guillermo meant even now, post-revelation.

And he loved him? What could Nandor offer to that, as he was? Selfish, cold, and dangerous to Guillermo’s continued breathing.

“I say, Guillermo,” Nadja called from the back, shockingly loud, showing just how thin the barrier really was and how little privacy they actually had for this little domestic. “Could you possibly, um, save some of this fight for when I am not trapped in a steel cage of death with you?”

Laszlo, for once, snored loudly, oblivious to the world.

“Also,” Nadja added, helpfully, “Maybe just, get each other off and then figure the rest out later, hmm?”

Guillermo gasped, scandalized.

“Just a suggestion. I am now going to sleep and will hear nothing for the rest of the day, because I am putting in these wonderful things called earplugs that Laszlo found at the last rest stop when we ate that lovely big redneck in the big red truck. Therefore nothing that happens for the next hour before sunrise will be heard by either of us!”

Nandor and Guillermo glanced briefly at each other, sizing one another up.

“I’m begging you,” Nadja said, on the verge of losing her shit. “I am so tired and this energy is so very bad for my skin.”

She sobbed briefly to herself and then cleared her throat.

“Plugs going in now! Do something or else!” She threatened, singsongingly, and Laszlo mumbled confusedly. She soothed him back to sleep and then there was silence.

Guillermo looked at Nandor warily, with a note of quiet desperation.

They wordlessly came to an agreement. This wasn’t solved. It wasn’t better. But for now, since they couldn’t seem to leave each other alone, they would take what they could get while it was still on offer.

Nandor struggled to unbuckle his seatbelt while Guillermo’s breathing sped up, and then Nandor ripped the belt the rest of the way.

Guillermo would yell at him about it later.

Nandor, on his knees in the front cab of an ugly, rickety RV, one hour before sunset, leaned into sniff Guillermo’s neck, and Guillermo bent his neck to accommodate him.

He carefully monitored the RV’s speed while his mind threatened to go entirely blank with pleasure. Guillermo could feel the rough hairs on Nandor’s beard rubbing over the sensitive skin of his neck while Nandor breathed him in and murmured nothings into the skin there, kissing and licking.

“Nandor,” Guillermo offered, while Nandor’s hand made its way slowly down Guillermo’s chest, down to the inseam of his pants.

“Guillermo,” Nandor whispered back feelingly. He nibbled the human’s ear gently, struggling not to nick it with his fang, but whimpering at the temptation.

It might not be much, but he could at least try to show Guillermo how much he cared for him. Try to make it up to him, in some small way that only Nandor could do.

Guillermo’s right hand reached down to rub circles into Nandor’s hip, and then when Nandor ran his teeth lightly over the skin on Guillermo’s shoulder, Guillermo gasped and rubbed Nandor the bulge in Nandor’s pants, upwards, once.

Nandor moaned and his head fell forward onto Guillermo’s shoulder, to Guillermo’s delight.

“Undo your pants,” Nandor commanded, sitting back on his heels and rubbing himself with Guillermo’s hand to take the edge off.

“What are you going to do?” Guillermo asked.

“What do you want, Guillermo?” Nandor grinned teasingly. “I’ll do whatever you want me to.”

“Fuck,” Guillermo panted, and shivered all over. He took his hand back and unbuttoned and unzipped his pants without further question.  
Then his hands tightened on the steering wheel and he sped back up. He had lagged farther behind Colin Robinson in the truck ahead of them, due to his distraction. He would have to be more careful.

“You’d better focus on the road, Guillermo,” Nandor leaned in, following his train of thought. “You don’t want to get so overwhelmed that we crash and die a horrible, fiery death. On a freeway in Ohio so soon before sunset,” breathed heavily over a sensitive spot right behind Guillermo’s ear.

Guillermo whimpered.

Nandor liked Guillermo in charge, but this was coming in a close second. Guillermo, normally so in control of himself, would soon be falling apart because of the things Nandor was about to do to him.

He hummed out a long moan and rubbed himself again, deeply looking forward to whatever was going to happen next.

A semi-truck was passing them, the driver looking over and making a jerking off motion.

Guillermo’s face turned bright red and he looked away instantly.

Nandor grinned and bared his fangs threateningly, and the truck driver rolled his eyes and finished passing them.

It was not great that Colin Robinson appeared to be going to exact fucking speed limit.

Nandor followed an internal logic at this that Guillermo wished not to be seen getting off, and needed to focus on the road well enough to keep them from dying.

Well, Nandor had the perfect solution.

He leaned over Guillermo’s lap slowly, making eye contact beneath the steering wheel, while Guillermo’s gaze shifted frantically between watching him and making sure they stayed in the lines on the freeway.

Nandor pulled Guillermo out of the confines of his underwear and helped him shift his hips further down, so he was slouching in the driver’s seat.

Nandor shoved Guillermo’s sweater farther up his belly and kissed the pudge there lovingly before licking the salty skin right above the erection just below.

“Nggh!” Guillermo said, and swore under his breath. “Nandor, hurry. Sunrise…” he trailed off feeling Nandors hands roaming and rubbing into his thighs and hips.

“Is not here yet,” Nandor assured, and licked up one long stripe.

Guillermo cursed in a long, one-breath stream of Spanish.

Their eyes met one final time. Nandor’s tongue ran over his own lips, savoring Guillermo’s taste. Lips that had just been pressed open against Guillermo’s dick.

Guillermo struggled against the lump in his throat.

Then, Nandor opened up wide. Fangs flashed in the dim light, and the wet mouth of the vampire engulfed him in one motion.

“Ah!” Guillermo gasped out, hips bucking up involuntarily. The old engine revved loudly, and the human whined.

“Guillermo,” Nandor praised, shoved his left arm under Guillermo’s ass and stroked Guilelrmo’s length with his right. “You drive me mad with desire,” he marveled, out of his mind, “But please mind the road,” and swallowed Guillermo down again.

“O-ohhh, ffff--,” Guillermo moaned out, eyes threatening to close in pleasure but trapped by driving a moving vehicle, trapped by the seatbelt, trapped inside Nandor’s grasp, and now trapped in the wet heat that was Nandor’s mouth, which also happened to have razor sharp, murderous fangs.

Guillermo sighed, floating on the sensation of Nandor just holding him in his mouth like a warm, wet hug.

Nandor experimentally bobbed his head once, up, then down.

“Just---Just like that,” Guillermo encouraged. Nandor’s tongue pressed and undulated against the underside. He bit off a curse as another vehicle passed them slowly, thankfully uninterested in them.

Nandor grunted in agreement, and began sucking and licking in earnest, feeling his skin start to tingle from the increasing light.

“Master!” Guillermo hissed out, unthinkingly, unaware.

Nandor’s hand under Guillermo’s backside squeezed Guillermo’s hip in response.

“Master… I’m getting close. Touch yourself,” he begged, desperately trying to regulate his panting breath and failing. “Hurry. It’s getting so light out, I don’t want you to die--”

Nandor’s mouth clamped down and sucked. It was as though he was trying to suck all of Guillermo out through his cock.

“Oh, Jesus,” Guillermo slurred, and Nandor spasmed all over from the pain of the epithet. “Sorry! Sorry, oh, fuck that feels so good…”

Nandor moaned from the previous pain, more turned on than ever. The tiny bit of burning was only ramping him up. Guillermo had been right; he would have to hurry up and finish this or he would be a pile of ash within the next several minutes.

“Nandor, Master--Don’t stop!” Guillermo begged. Nandor’s mouth was making sloppy wet sounds, hums, pants, and grunts, that made his toes curl.

Nandor’s right hand made quick work of his own fly.

Nandor pulled himself out and started stroking furiously as he bobbed his head on Guillermo’s twitching cock.

“Master!” Guillermo gasped out, feeling the precipice approaching at breakneck speed.

The hand digging into Guillermo’s side from under him, embracing him over the driver’s seat and holding him in place, clamped down painfully. Guillermo could feel that there would be a bruise there later, a dark one, and the thought of Nandor having marked him like that made his vision white out. He would be the only one who would know of the hand-shaped Nandor-sized bruise on his hip, and he would feel it every time he moved or sat or walked. It was astonishing to think about.

I’m going to--” Guillermo warned, scrabbling handful of Nandor’s hair and pulling, but Nandor only moaned harder. The resulting vibrations sent Guillermo over the edge.

“Nandor! Ah!” He whined, as the vampire greedily drank him down through each spasm.

Guillermo’s head hit the head rest with a loud thump, bonelessly, while Nandor sucked and licked all traces of Guillermo’s orgasm from him.

He sped the RV back up and set it back to rights in the lane, only distantly aware of the reality he was viewing out of the front window.

No reality could possibly be as good as the one Nandor had just given to him.

He twitched, overloaded with the continued sensation, and shoved weakly at Nandor’s shoulder.

Finally, after one more lingering suck, Nandor pulled off with a self-satisfied smack of his lips and leaned back in close to breath in Guillermo’s neck, burying his face there at the nape, where the curls met skin.

Nandor began whispering into Guillermo’s ear while his lips and fangs brushed against the skin there and Guillermo bared his neck in an open, loose-muscled invitation.

“Guillermo, my Guillermo,” Nandor growled, “You are mine and I am yours. The things I want to do with you… I want you to tie me to a bed with silver rope, whip me, pull my hair… I want you to kiss me and fuck me, and I want to fuck you. I would defy the world for you, if you would stay with me and let me… Oh…” Nandor hiccuped a short gasp.

“Nandor,” Guillermo pressed his lips Nandor’s forehead, holding him tenderly behind his neck to keep him steady while the RV rocked gently along the road.

“Let me love you,” Nandor finished, and bit down.

Guillermo gasped and spasmed again, eyes rolling back in his head while Nandor sucked greedily and dead to the world.

The RV veered violently and the tires squeaked as Guillermo came back to himself.

He had orgasmed, again, dry, and soft.

His hands shook as he desperately brought the RV back to rights again and in the right lane. He tried to pull at Nandor’s hair, push at his shoulder, but no response. He then punched as hard as he could to any part of Nandor he could reach, all to no avail.

Nandor was sucking, clamped down on Guillermo’s neck, making long drawn out moaning whines, as though Guillermo’s blood was mana of the gods.

Guillermo fuzzily began to see exactly what predicament he was currently in, and increased his efforts to push Nandor away. If he pushed too hard, though, before Nandor could loosen his grasp, the skin would rip right open, and they would be in an entirely different predicament.

Guillermo, unfortunately, was quickly losing the blood with which he could panic, and distantly, could see the burner cell phone ringing silently, insistent--Colin Robinson was calling from the truck to make sure they were alright.

He probably already knew exactly what was going on.

Guillermo’s vision pulsed. He was losing blood rapidly.

“Nandor,” Guillermo warned, and pulled out a stake. He pressed the sharp end firmly over Nandor’s heart.

Nandor moaned, blissful, and still coming. Little dribbles were still spurting from the tip of his cock, his hips juddering forward through each one.

Guillermo was beginning to feel weak.

He flattened the long side of the stake along Nandor’s chest and shoved.

He felt the skin on his neck tearing as Nandor fell backwards against the passenger side seat, bewildered and loose-limbed, holding the stake in his two hands.

Guillermo’s blood covered his lips and beard, his face deeply relaxed in a drunken bliss.

The RV began to slow, and Guillermo guided it numbly to the shoulder.

Through a hazy fog he could hear someone leaning on the horn as they passed, but could do nothing about it.

The tires going over the rumble strips seemed to wake Nandor from his blood-drunk trance, because his eyes cleared, and he looked down at the stake in his hands. Dropping it like it was a holy relic, all at once he finally became aware of what he had done.

Blood was gushing from the wound in Guillermo’s neck and he was turning white with his hands losing purchase on the wheel.

It was minutes away from sunrise.

“Guillermo,” Nandor said helplessly, panicked, helping him finish steering onto the shoulder of the road and come to a full stop. Guillermo had had the remaining energy to put the RV into park and then turn it off, and then he lost consciousness.

Nandor could see that the wound in his neck was bleeding sluggishly, although still entirely too quickly. Guillermo’s face was deathly pale, lips tinged blue.

“No,” Nandor said firmly. He would order Guillermo not to die. “No!” he shouted again, shaking the human.

The human’s head lolled limply from side to side.

“Guillermo? Why are you sleeping? This is not the place to fall asleep--” He knew that Guillermo was bleeding out because of him. He knew that. Something in him couldn’t let him fully believe it, though. It couldn’t be possible. He wouldn’t do that to his Guillermo. He would never.

Nandor numbly felt his eyes begin to burn as he looked up out of the windshield and saw Colin Robinson sprinting from the stopped truck half a mile down the road, eyes glowing bright blue but panicked in a way Nandor had never seen.

Somehow, that was what made him snap into action.

With finality, Nandor wrapped his torn cloak around the both of them, pulled Guillermo into his arms, and retreated into the back of the RV.

The back bedroom was shut tightly with Nadja and Laszlo inside, Nandor was grateful for that.

He lowered Guillermo to the couch next to the little kitchenette, holding desperately onto the gash in his neck. He silently willed blood to clot, finally, but to no avail.

Nandor put his ear to the humans chest and listened. The pulse was very weak. If the wound didn’t stop bleeding soon, Guillermo would die.

“Guillermo,” Nandor reasoned, and then couldn’t continue. Guillermo couldn’t hear him.

He sobbed once and fought against crying. He was a mighty conqueror. He had killed thousands of humans, possibly millions, if he counted his conquests while he was still human.

How could this one absolutely destroy him like this?

Front cab door of the RV opened and slammed shut, and Nandor could hear Colin Robinson catching his breath in the front seat, and then scrambling past the front console to the closed accordion door.

The sun was just barely up.

“Hey, uh, Nandor?” Colin panted breathlessly. He was probably sweaty. Nandor wrinkled his nose. Leave it to Colin Robinson to ruin these precious last moments he had with Guillermo.

“I have something for you, but you’re going to need to do something for me for it because after this I won’t be able to get us to safety.” Colin tapped on the door to make sure he was being heard.

“Go away, Colin Robinson. Guillermo is dying,” He let his forehead fall to Guillermo’s chest, still clutching the wound in an attempt to stanch the now slow pulses of blood oozing from it.

“Yeah, I got that much Nandor, thanks for the update. I’m going to give you something to save Guillermo and then I’m going to go into a small coma for a couple of days, NBD, but after I do this I need you to follow the exact instructions on the cell phone I am about to slide over to you.”

The accordion door opened and closed so quickly Nandor almost didn’t know it had happened, but he felt and heard the cell phone sliding over to him and come to a stop against his kneeling foot.

“I cannot stress this enough, if you don’t follow those instructions to the letter, we are all going to die. No pressure, buddy.”

Nandor picked it up, confused.

“Now Nandor, I need you to hurry. Bring Guillermo over to the door, and put his hand through. I’m going to give him enough energy to survive until someone gets here to help us.” Nandor could hear Colin retching.

“Ugh, this is so gross.” Colin Robinson groused.

“What, Colin Robinson? You can save Guillermo?” Nandor couldn’t comprehend what he just heard. There were too many emotions parading through Nandor’s mind at that moment to fully track.

“Nandor!” Colin barked through the accordion door, pounding on it. “You have to hurry. Guillermo is fading fast!”

Without another hesitation, and although he was still confused, Nandor picked up his limp, too small and fragile human, and held his hand through the crack in the door.

There was a flash of blue light, a thud from behind the door, and he could feel Guillermo’s pulse gain strength. The wound under his hand stopped bleeding and the flesh, although still heavily gashed, had knit together somewhat.

Nandor could no longer contain himself. He wept openly into Guillermo’s chest. There was no one there to see him, or hear him, with Nadja and Laszlo earplugged in the back. Colin was out like a light, lying awkwardly on his front on the other side of the door. 

Nandor, with tears streaming down his face, quickly readjusted Colin with a grimace so he didn’t suffocate against the ugly yellow linoleum, and then slammed the door shut again, hissing, as the sunlight burned off a layer of his flesh.

Colin Robinson had better thank him for that, later. Although he supposed he could call it even, considering that he had just apparently saved Guillermo’s life.

They were on the side of the freeway in Ohio, the sun had just risen, and Guillermo had just nearly died.

If Colin Robinson, of all people, had not done whatever he did, Nandor would have been Guillermo’s murderer.

Nandor sobbed wetly and held Guillermo tightly in his lap, grasping him as though if he held him closer it would make it less scary.

He was seven hundred fifty-eight years old, and he had never been so scared in his life as he was when Guillermo had been about to die.

When he finally calmed down moments, or hours later, and was convinced enough that Guillermo would continue breathing, Nandor realized with a jolt that Colin, damn him, was right once again.

They were fish in a barrel to whoever might spot a shitty old RV and truck on the side of the road, the latter of which was carrying three heavy and very old coffins. The former of which also happened to be carrying three deadly vampires (helpless in the daytime), one deadly vampire slayer (unconscious, weak from blood loss), and one Dilbert-looking energy vampire (currently in a coma).

Nandor grabbed the phone and turned the screen on, holding Guillermo in his lap and rocking, more to comfort himself than anyone else, and followed the instructions.

They sucked--like, a lot--once he realized what they actually meant, but he did them nonetheless.

If only to live long enough to make this up to Guillermo.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the shuffle. I realized these worked better as part of the same story and then promptly messed everything up. Hopefully it's good now.
> 
> You can expect an update sometime before the end of next week (August 22 at the latest). If I don't post something before then, feel free to pester me. ADHD is a bitch.


	3. Spacesuits in Museums

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When he saw Guillermo again, which was much longer of a wait than he wanted in so many ways, and it was not at all how Nandor had pictured.
> 
> Here he was, waiting in what was essentially a love hotel for vampires, waiting for Guillermo to arrive. There were a lot of events that had come about in order to bring about this particular effect, but it was their motivations that had culminated here, of all places.
> 
> One, Guillermo needed to get the rest of the psychic vampiric energy out of him or Guillermo would turn into an energy vampire. Nobody wanted this; least of all Guillermo.
> 
> Two, the process of getting the rest of the psychic energy out of him would help Guillermo heal the rest of the way.
> 
> Three, both Guillermo and Nandor had signed the release forms and consented to be here. It was the safest place to do it, and this was the safest way to accomplish the goal.

When he saw Guillermo again, which was much longer of a wait than he wanted in so many ways, and it was not at all how Nandor had pictured.

Here he was, waiting in what was essentially a love hotel for vampires, waiting for Guillermo to arrive. There were a lot of events that had come about in order to bring about this particular effect, but it was their motivations that had culminated here, of all places.

One, Guillermo needed to get the rest of the psychic vampiric energy out of him or Guillermo would turn into an energy vampire. Nobody wanted this; least of all Guillermo.

Two, the process of getting the rest of the psychic energy out of him would help Guillermo heal the rest of the way.

Three, both Guillermo and Nandor had signed the release forms and consented to be here. It was the safest place to do it, and this was the safest way to accomplish the goal.

They had both read enough sex education pamphlets within the past 24 hours than either of them had ever thought existed. Guillermo had seen some when he was in school as a kid, sure, but those ones had not included such titles as, “Vampire / Human Sex: How to Not Kill Your Partner” or “The Best Way for Non-Lethal Sex? Try Garlic-Infused Steel Ropes!”

Nandor had bought some of the ropes, of course. He had hidden them under one of the pillows. He was unsure exactly why, because both he and Guillermo knew why they were here, and the safety of restraints were a big part of why they had agreed to it.

Somehow, he couldn’t stomach the shameful or unhappy look Guillermo might have on his face if he saw the ropes, out in the open, as though the sex was the only reason at all that they were there.

Nandor was still in the doghouse for bringing about this result, but Guillermo had admitted that they had both lost control of themselves because of how they felt and hadn’t talked about it enough beforehand. If nothing else happened from this little side trip, they could learn what tools worked for them to be together more safely.

If they couldn’t do that, well. Something else would need to be figured out. Unfortunately, “something else” was out of the question until they could figure out a better way of existing together that didn’t put either of them in mortal peril.

Nandor had to find a way to convince Guillermo that the sex, and the blood, were not the only reasons that he wanted Guillermo around. He was at a complete loss, though. He had never (or extremely rarely) openly shown affection, not even when he was a human and married to 37 women. Sex was a different matter. Then, it was about power, control, and release. He was well versed in the latter.

Nandor hoped, desperately, that showing Guillermo that he was willing to let Guillermo take complete control would somehow convince him that Nandor wanted this to work. 

Nandor was in this for the long haul, even if that meant Guillermo stayed human and lived a human lifespan.

One way or another, though, Nandor needed Guillermo to know.

While he waited, Nandor sipped on some donated blood, laced with some kind of alcohol, possibly whiskey. He couldn’t quite tell. It smelled smokey, though. It was nothing compared to Guillermo’s blood, but that was neither here nor there.

Time stopped when Guillermo knocked on the door nervously, and used the key card to let himself in. He pulled out several packets of things from a pocket of his trenchcoat, and placed them on the table by the door.

That done, he stood for a moment and stared at Nandor, clearly trying to find something to say, and coming up empty.

Nandor could see dark circles under Guillermo’s eyes, and he looked somewhat sunken, as though he had lost weight. Nandor supposed he had, if you counted blood loss.

They stood, watching one another warily, unsure who would make the first move.

It was a particularly loud moan from a room down the hall that made them finally break eye contact and relax a little.

Guillermo began.

“I got some stuff from downstairs. There were a bunch of baskets full of things. I just grabbed some handfuls at random. Hopefully some of it helps.”

He laid them out all next to each other, and Nandor came over to look.

Single-use packets of different kinds of lubes, some wet wipes, a few cock rings, and an assortment of condoms.

“I missed you, Guillermo,” Nandor said, and turned to face him.

Guillermo froze, rigid, and stood staring down unseeingly at the table, looking broken.

“I… I missed you too, Nandor,” he said, and started crying.

Nandor visibly floundered for what to do. His instinct was to pull Guillermo to him, but was he allowed to do that? When Guillermo had wanted hugs from him, Nandor had always rebuffed him. Now, things were exceedingly fragile.

Could Guillermo trust Nandor to be that close? It hadn’t been very long since Nandor had nearly killed him. They were both wary of one another, but they were both more wary of Nandor.

“Guillermo,” Nandor said, feelingly.

He reached out to rub Guillermo’s arm, and Guillermo collapsed into Nandor’s chest.

He stood there sobbing for a minute or two, while Nandor held him.

“They wouldn’t let me see you,” Nandor said, voice wavering. “I didn’t know if you were okay, or what.” He leaned down and pressed his face to the top of Guillermo’s head.

“I’m okay, Nandor,” Guillermo replied, looking like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He sniffed wetly. “Just… hungry. All of the time.”

“Yes,” Nandor nodded and pulled back to look into Guillermo’s eyes. This time Guillermo allowed himself to be looked at, and looked back at Nandor in return.

A wall that Guillermo had been holding up within him had come down, Nandor could see it in his eyes. It was not gone completely, but Guillermo still felt safe with Nandor. Safe enough to be open like this.

“I want to help you with that,” Nandor said, simply.

Guillermo’s eyes sharpened with a desperate longing--a ravenous hunger.

“Can I?” Nandor prompted.

Guillermo nodded tightly and said, “Mm-hmm.”

Nandor reached for Guillermo, but Guillermo was too fast.

“Can’t hold back, I’m sorry,” he said, and began pushing Nandor backwards to the bed.

“Anything, Guillermo.” Nandor grinned, happy to be back on some surer footing. Feelings were iffy. Sex, on the other hand. “Take what you want from me. Take everything.”

He made an Oof sound when the backs of his knees hit the mattress and he fell backwards.

Guillermo was on him instantly, pushing his wrists back on the bed, and pinning him there.

Making sure that Nandor’s wrists stayed on the bed with one assertive look, Guillermo leaned back, sitting astride Nandor’s thighs.

Guillermo’s hands pressed and rubbed into the muscles of Nandor’s legs right where they met Guillermo’s, and then the hands moved upwards. His hands lifted the shirt there and skimmed appreciatively over the muscles in his belly.

Guillermo’s breath was accelerating.

“You’re still so…” Guillermo began, with no intention of finishing.

The hands went further up into the shirt, and rubbed the nipples there. Guillermo’s eyes were trained laser-like to Nandor’s reactions.

Nandor, who had been yearning for Guillermo’s presence, let alone his touch, with incredible intensity, swallowed hard and pushed his hips upwards, hoping for some friction with his head pushed back into the bed and eyes closed, utterly engrossed in the sensations.

Guillermo’s hands unbuttoned the shirt slowly, rubbing more skin as he was revealed to him.

“Guillermo,” Nandor breathed, pleading. There was no command there any longer, only a wish.

A rib was thumbed, with a nick of fingernail. Then, Guillermo’s hand raked down, gently, from sternum to navel, to see the muscles in Nandor’s abdomen twitch.

After Guillermo had licked each of Nandor’s nipples and rubbed the spit into their skin, he signed happily. He looked sated, for the moment.

Then, he moved back up to lean over Nandor.

Guillermo’s eyes were glowing golden yellow, watching Nandor with reverent intensity. 

Nandor pleaded with his eyes, and Guillermo relented.

Guillermo, shy and hesitant despite pushing Nandor down on the bed moments before, leaned down and kissed Nandor.

Nandor moaned and squirmed. He wanted more than anything to hold Guillermo in place and kiss him for, oh, hours. Nandor thought perhaps kisses like this one were the reason people wanted to live forever; so that kisses like this could last. And Nandor was the lucky bastard on the receiving end.

Suddenly, Nandor’s hands found their way to Guillermo’s shoulders, and he pushed backwards gently, but urgently.

Nandor’s eyes had turned black, and Nandor hissed, almost apologetically.

“Guillermo,” he warned.

Guillermo scrambled away, frightened.

If Nandor wasn’t hard as a rock, and happy that Guillermo had been at least willing to be in the same room with him prior to this moment, he would have started crying. Guillermo, frightened of Nandor? There was a time that Nandor would have found that to be a matter of course.

Now, it just made him miserable.

“Ropes, Guillermo. Under the pillow.” Nandor laid back down, moving himself so that his hands were better aligned with the headboard, which, now that he looked closer, appeared to be made of woven iron or steel. He closed his eyes and took some centering breaths, listening to Guillermo find the package of rope, and the tear into it like some kind of animal.

Faster than he could have anticipated, Nandor’s hands were bound in a complicated knot from one of their little brochures that not even Nandor had been able to accomplish.

The thought of Guillermo practicing it for the sole purpose of tying Nandor up made him punch out a breath and close his eyes again, thinking of unsexy things to try and calm down.

“Look at you,” Guillermo kneeled on the bed next to him, and the hands were roaming again. The skimmed, scratched, and pinched, wherever Nandor was bare. Guillermo looked at Nandor as though Nandor were a Thanksgiving feast, and Guillermo a starving man.

“Tell me that you want this,” Guillermo said, softly.

Nandor, again struggling with words, tried his best.

He remembered the time that Guillermo had made him feel better after he failed his citizenship test. The time that Guillermo had stayed with him until he fell asleep, when he was afraid.

“Guillermo I want you in whatever way you want me to have you,” Nandor whispered, feeling reverent. “I’m tied to a bed with a vampire slayer. I wouldn’t do that for just anyone. Only for you. Only you.”

Guillermo sighed harshly and nodded, pawing all over Nandor’s front again.

Straddling Nandor, he ground down once, and they both moaned loudly. It was glorious.

There was a few minutes, although not nearly enough, of this wonderful friction.

“I’m going to… go use the bathroom for a sec. Be right back,” Guillermo got up, to Nandor’s whining protest.

“But…” he began.

“I’ll be quick,” Guillermo said. “I just… There’s a way that I have wanted to do this for a while. Will you let me have it?”

Nandor nodded and waited.

He stared at the ceiling above the old, heavy four-poster bed, mind reeling.

All of this had begun when Guillermo had swung down from the rafters in the Theatres des Vampires.

No, that wasn’t right. It had begun when he had met Guillermo that first night, over a decade ago, back when Guillermo still worked for Panera Bread. The adoration and awe Nandor had seen in Guillermo’s eyes.

It had been a long time since someone had looked at him like that. It was like a drug. He had wanted more, even then.

Guillermo returned several minutes later, blushing furiously, and wearing nothing but a fluffy white robe.

Nandor wanted to see everything under the robe. He couldn’t have been harder if he tried. He reminded himself this wasn’t for him.

“Please,” he begged, nonetheless.

Guillermo’s gaze hardened, and the eyes turned golden yellow again. He nodded in agreement, and got back up on the bed with Nandor.

First he was leaning over him to the side. He leaned into Nandor’s neck and breathed in deeply. Nandor tilted his head obligingly.

Guillermo’s mouth latched on gently, and began sucking.

Nandor hummed.

Then, there was a hard bite down, and Nandor’s hips bucked again, uselessly, into the air. If Guillermo didn’t get a move on soon, Nandor would be out of commission too quickly   
again. Not that that state would last very long.

Again he found himself awed by how turned on he was by the human biting and sucking a path down his body, leaving harsh red teeth marks, tongue laving, but not breaking the skin. The shiny spit that was left behind made Nandor’s head spin, thinking that Guillermo was literally salivating over his body.

Nandor could relate. It was more than Nandor could bear thinking about, that Guillermo might want to eat him up, much like Nandor wanted to eat Guillermo up as well.

Nandor thought that might be the purest expression of love he’d ever conceived of, and wished deeply that Guillermo would drink him up, right now.

“Guillermo,” Nandor moaned, as Guillermo came to a stop at Nandor’s pants.

Guillermo sat back on his heels, leaning back to survey his work on Nandor’s pale, hard vampire body. Red marks quickly disappeared, but the wet path of his tongue lingered.

Nandor wanted more kissing, but didn’t want to ask for it out loud so soon. He was desperate, yes, but he didn’t want to show his hand so quickly.

Restraint, he reminded himself. Restraint.

Guillermo clearly had other ideas in mind, for he made quick work of Nandor’s pants, and yanked them down with little ceremony or grace.

The manhandling had Nandor’s mind spinning.

If Guillermo could just lift him right up like this, he could certainly throw him around. Something about Guillermo had changed, and his strength was astonishing. He would put a bookmark in that thought, and save it for later, because now, Guillermo was moving back up to straddle Nandor, and reached behind him for Nandor’s cock.

Nandor was shocked at himself with how long it took him to realize what Guillermo was doing. When he did, he struggled against the ropes to help him. He wanted to wrap a hand around each hip and shove Guillermo’s hips down, and his own up. Because it was the best idea he thought Guillermo had ever had, what he was about to do. Nandor had to show him he agreed, and had to show him how well received it was.

Unfortunately, that’s when he felt the ropes burning his wrists, where they had strained past their tension. They would feel like any other kind of rope until pulled on too hard, then the stretching in the links would open a path to the burning substance inside, a mixture of silver and garlic.

He gasped through the burning pain, and put his arms back down above his head frantically, not wanting to miss watching what was going to happen next.

Guillermo lowered himself down onto Nandor in one fast move.

They both made a noise like the air being punched out of them, and then sat there with their eyes closed, relishing this new sensation.

“Ah… Nandor,” Guillermo whined, and his hips twitched forward. “It’s so big.”

Nandor fought with himself not to buck upwards, but it was a struggle. He wanted to let Guillermo get used to it first. Guillermo was in control now. Nandor could try to practice at least a little self-control, after all, couldn’t he?

“You’re so good,” Guillermo stroked a hand down Nandor’s face, and Nandor battled the urge to take a finger into his mouth. That wouldn’t do. No matter how badly he wanted it.

Instead, he licked it.

Their eyes met, Nandor’s slightly ashamed, and Guillermo mindlessly lustful, bearing down and stroking himself briefly, leaned down and kissed Nandor, who met him halfway, belly muscles straining to put pressure into the kiss; show Guillermo how much he wanted everything that Guillermo was giving him.

Nandor felt a lump rising in his throat, but didn’t want to cry right now. He knew that he was a mess, and so was Guillermo. They were a mess about each other. But they were still trying. Nandor couldn’t help but think that it was wonderful.

Nandor would do his best not to mess this up again. They had more tools now than they did before, but it was still amazing how often Nandor found the bloodlust mingling almost imperceptibly with his regular lust.

How had that gotten so tangled, over the years?

He would show Guillermo that he was trying. That he could do better.

If only to keep things like the incident happening for as long as possible. For forever, if he could get away with it.

Guillermo’s eyes were now a constant warm glow, and Nandor felt the fight go out of him. Guillermo was draining him of his self-control. He growled and bucked upwards.

Guillermo bounced with a surprised yelp.

Nandor would have felt bad about it, he really would have, but the angry, devious look that Guillermo shot him while his eyes glowed with their own vampiric light, followed by Guillermo’s own dick twitching like mad as he rutted in small back and forth rocking motions, had him grinning.

“Yesss, Guillermo, like that,” Nandor breathed, as the human leaned back to angle Nandor inside him a certain way.

Guillermo’s hand came up to move a curl from off of his forehead, sweat starting to bead there.

Guillermo finally ripped off the robe, no longer caring, and breathed a sigh of relief at the cool air that he could now feel all over.

“Beautiful,” Nandor said, ecstatic.

Guillermo then leaned back, bracing himself from behind on Nandor’s thighs, and moved his hips up and down in small circles until he found his own prostate.

“Mm! Oh fuck!” Guillermo shouted. “There it is, fuck.”

“Yes, so good,” Nandor replied mindlessly, hips thrusting up in the rhythm that Guillermo had set.

“I never knew… Why didn’t you tell me about this?” Guillermo mumbled thoughtlessly.

Nandor shook his head, also confused as to why he would stupidly withhold such vital information, when it could have led to this much, much sooner.

In a deep part of Nandor’s mind that was still rational, he knew why, of course.

Firstly, it had never occurred to Nandor that this was a thing Guillermo wanted to know. Secondly, Nandor had never known that Guillermo didn’t already know.

The reminder, sudden and sharp, that Guillermo was a virgin and this was his first time having anal sex with anyone, had Nandor cursing in a long-forgotten language, and straining against the ropes again.

He hissed.

“Guillermo, kiss me,” He begged. “Kiss me again, please.”

“Not yet,” Guillermo whispered, eyes closed and lost to the world while he rode Nandor to his own content. “This is amazing and I don’t want to stop it yet.”

“Ah,” Nandor cursed urgently. “Oh, Guillermo, don’t stop!”

“Don’t you dare come yet!” Guillermo commanded.

Nandor whined and whimpered, going rigid all over. If he didn’t move, he might succeed in following this command.

Guillermo continued riding Nandor with singular intensity, Nandor panting in utter suspense. He felt his orgasm so, so close. If Guillermo did or said one more thing to Nandor outside of what he was already doing, despite Nandor holding still and keeping his eyes squeezed shut against the image, he was afraid he might come anyway.

Then what would they do?

Nandor wanted to show Guillermo that he could be good. He wanted that more than anything.

“Guillermo,” he panted, “I don’t know how much longer I can hold on!” He warned.

Guillermo swore vociferously in Spanish, and ground downwards.

“Not my problem,” he tossed, and continued to move his hips. “You feel so good,” Guillermo breathed. “Did you feel like this to everyone who fucked you before me?”

Nandor coughed out a surprised yelp.

“Wh-why mention them now?” He sputtered, beginning to shake all over from the strain.

Guillermo mulled this over, moving from his position leaning back to brace his hands over Nandor’s chest instead.

“I always wondered what you would feel like inside me,” Guillermo said, and Nandor gnashed his teeth. “Now that I know, I can’t understand how they didn’t want you all of the time.”

Was Guillermo torturing him? It felt like it. But it didn’t hurt like torturing normally did.

Nandor could feel another wave of energy leaving him and he swallowed hard.

“Guillermo,” Nandor warned again. “You say something like that and you expect me not to… Not to come?” He gasped. He could feel it starting to break outside of the walls of his control, building up from the top of his head to the tips of his toes.

Guillermo let out a breathy laugh.

“Well, go on then, Master. Come inside me, now. Show me how that feels, too.”

His hips thrust up once, twice, again. Guillermo felt so good around him. He had no control over this. Guillermo was riding him while looking down at Nandor with a playful, smug smile. It was amazing. Perfect.

“Master,” Guillermo moaned, touching himself, bouncing downwards to meet each of Nandor’s upward thrusts.

“Ah! Guillermo!” Nandor exclaimed, and came.

Nandor’s vision went white and his entire body both tensed and relaxed at the same time. He must have let out a noise of some kind.

He was in another place. Here, everything was fine and the world had no flaws. Would that he could stay here for the rest of time, inside Guillermo, like this.

Each spasm of pleasure, he came back into focus a little bit more, lax and gasping to catch his breath.

Guillermo was riding him through it and finally came to a stop when it was over. Guillermo was still hard, but he was looking at Nandor with hunger and desperation mixed with affection.

“Fuck,” Guillermo said, still hard. “That was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Nandor agreed vaguely.

“What about you, Guillermo?” Nandor said dazedly.

Guillermo looked down suddenly, surprised.

“Oh,” he said. “I just…”

His body catching up quicker than him, his hips juddered forward once more, and Nandor slipped out.

“Ahhh!” Guillermo shouted, as he felt the come run out of him. “Oh, that’s weird. Not... Not bad, but weird.”

Nandor wished more than anything that he could hold Guillermo close to him with his own arms. The danger was too high, though. He couldn’t bite Guillermo now, not when psychic energy still lingered.

But his mouth watered.

Nandor licked his lips and tried not to think of it.

“I felt…” Guillermo began, also out of breath. “I felt you come. I mean, not just… inside me. But I also felt it at the same time you did. That’s weird, right?”

Nandor whimpered, eyes rolling back a little.

If Guillermo kept saying things like that, he wouldn’t have to wait very long at all for Nandor to be ready again.

“But I’m still hard. I think I could still…” Guillermo gathered up a few fingers of Nandor’s cum and began to spread Nandor’s legs.

“Guillermo?” Nandor began, suddenly unsure.

“Can I?” Guillermo looked up, fingers poised over Nandor’s hole, expectant. The slick fingers rubbed the whorl of flesh.

“Please, yes,” Nandor said, then stuttered. “Y-yes! Just… Be gentle?” Nandor asked, hating the vulnerability in his voice.

But then, Guillermo smiled brightly, warmly. Nandor smiled back nervous, pleasantly surprised.

“I’ll be gentle, Nandor,” he said, like they were both in on a secret joke.

Guillermo moved back up Nandor’s body to look into his eyes closer.

“Do you still want me to kiss you?” Guillermo asked, seriously.

Nandor could see the squareness of Guillermo’s jaw, the serious look that had always projected stubbornness to Nandor; he could now see it as resolution, confidence. Intensity of focus.

It made Nandor shiver with anticipation. He could feel himself hardening again already. That look. It made Nandor want to surrender.

The finger was circling around, and around.

Nandor tilted his head back and leaned up in supplication, feeling wanton. If he was honest, he wanted Guillermo’s kisses to never end. He couldn’t say that out loud now, though. Not when he was about to be fucked by his former familiar. The connotations of weakness were ones he still instinctually flinched at.

But looking into Guillermo’s eyes, here, with his body resting on his, Guillermo’s finger circling his entrance, tied to a bed, and having had one of the best orgasms in his life, most likely getting ready to have another--he was shockingly at peace with relenting.

Guillermo met him there, and pressed him back into the mattress with a firm, slow kiss, just as the first finger entered him.

He moved to release the kiss to let out a gasp--it had been centuries since anyone had done this to him--but Guillermo used his other hand to hold the back of Nandor’s neck, and keep kissing him through it.

Nandor thought he might melt. This was altogether too much and not enough.

Then suddenly, Guillermo’s finger, body, and lips were withdrawn and he was left blinking stupidly into a blank space.

As soon as he had processed that Guillermo had gone to the table by the door, he was back and ripping into a packet of lube with little finesse. It spilled all over his fingers and he cursed.

Gathering it all onto one hand and then rubbing the rest of it onto his own length, the lubed hand returned to Nandor’s entrance, this time with two fingers.

Nandor keened, surprised.

“Guillermo!” He shouted, as the fingers were in with no preamble.

“Sorry,” Guillermo mumbled into Nandor’s lips, kissing him all over his face.

There was a frantic look in Guillermo’s eyes. The golden glow was stronger than ever.

“I just… I need you now, or,” he explained. “Something is happening in me. I can feel it building up. I need to do it now, or…”

He trailed off, and Nandor nodded.

“Come on then, vampire slayer,” Nandor challenged, fully hard again, and ready, despite the hasty preparation. “My Guillermo.”

Guillermo made a wounded noise, lined himself up, and shoved himself inside Nandor in one hard shove. He didn’t give Nandor any time to adjust, which had Nandor yelping in surprise followed by a long, drawn out moan, as Guillermo began thrusting in earnest.

Guillermo shoved Nandor’s knees back to rest beside his ears, and pounded into him relentlessly. The yellow glow was sputtering out, fading, and then rearing back up with intensity.

“Nandor,” Guillermo sobbed, moaning. “Wanted you the moment I set eyes on you,” he babbled.

“Ngh!” Nandor shouted, as Guillermo had unwittingly found his prostate. Nandor reached around his bent leg to start stroking himself.

Guillermo slapped his hand away and pulled out, to Nandor’s offended grunt.

Then he found himself spun around, face down into the mattress, while Guillermo slotted back in without hesitation. Nandor gasped with shock.

“Eleven years of waiting and I get to have you,” Guillermo said, awed, breath punched out of him with every thrust. “So long to wait. So long.”

“Too long,” Nandor agreed, dick rubbing into the sheets below him. It was too rough, but it was also electrifying.

“Nandor,” Guillermo huffed, voice rising in pitch. He was getting close.

“Nandor,” he repeated. “I’m going to turn you back around. When we come, I want you to bite me and drink me. Then I want you to turn me. Think you can do that?” He was losing it, Nandor could tell, and it was in the same way that Nandor himself was, too.

“Anything! Guillermo, anything to keep you with me forever! To never leave me again!” Nandor begged.

It was not becoming of a vampire or a conqueror, Nandor knew this. But no amount of pride or power was worth losing this. Guillermo had given his consent. They would be together.

In a move that Nandor struggled to follow, Guillermo released the knots around Nandor’s wrists with a quick press each, flipped him back around, and then pulled Nandor back onto his hips so Nandor could ride him.

Nandor was so on it.

He bounced on Guillermo’s dick with abandon, not caring how he looked. Guillermo grasped both of his hips and helped, with an awed, blissed out expression.

The yellow glow was completely gone from Guillermo’s eyes.

“Is... Ah!” Nandor started and then tried again. “Is it all gone?”

Guillermo thrust up emphatically, and nodded, “Yeah. Felt the last of it burn out a minute ago.” He smiled. “We’re all clear.”

Nandor grinned back, wickedly.

He reached behind him and lifted both of Guillermo’s legs at the knees so his feet were propped up on the bed. Then, Nandor leaned back against them and shoved his hips down, while wrapping a ruthless hand around his own dick and pumping.

He wheezed out a delighted breath as he felt Guillermo’s dick hitting his prostate.

“Oh, shit,” Guillermo crooned, losing focus on exactly what Nandor was doing, because whatever it was, it was amazing.

For several moments, the only sound in the room was the slapping of flesh against flesh and the panting gasps of the two, singularly focused on their shared goal.

“Nandor!” Guillermo tried to warn, “Nandor!” He repeated instead, and came deeply inside Nandor.

Nandor made a triumphant, ravenous growl, and heaved himself up Guillermo to his neck, watching the rapturous sighs on his face while his eyes roamed Nandor’s face, half-lidded, without focus.

Guillermo nodded, and tilted his head back.

Nandor bit down as gently as he could, which wasn’t much, and rutted into the divot between Guillermo’s hip and leg. It was slick with Guillermo’s come, and felt like heaven, particularly with the taste of Guillermo’s blood on his tongue.

As he sucked down Guillermo’s delicious, perfect blood, he rutted one final time, and came, spurting into the already slick, wet mess of Guillermo’s belly.

He rubbed his hands all through it, feeling a cherishing delight of such ample evidence of their enjoyment, and then reached up to scratch a long shallow wound across his neck.

He pulled Guillermo’s weak, willing, blissed out mouth up to it.

The moment Guillermo latched on, and began sucking, a tension within him eased.

He wouldn’t have to be alone, anymore.

He knew that things wouldn’t be perfect. Nadja and Laszlo were deeply in love, and still had their own problems. He was not fooling himself that a vampiric relationship was without its flaws and pitfalls.

But for right now, everything was where it should be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm gonna be 100% honest here in that I really super duper tried to come up with more of a plot but it bored the hell out of me so here you go, have your porn and I hope you're happy with it. It's all I could get myself to write lol.
> 
> I truly wanted to follow Guillermo along a path of discovering who he was as a vampire slayer, and do like a whole training montage while Nandor lusted over his hot, dangerous body, but I work full time during the week and have my 4 year-old daughter on the weekends, so there wasn't a lot of time or energy leftover.
> 
> There was only porn.
> 
> Also, sorry again for deleting the original story, titled "The Heart Wants." I'm still new to posting fanfic on this website so lesson learned ^^;


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